Moral licensing is an effect where someone who was initially moral
subsequently behaves immorally. The effect is controversial, with some
studies finding licensing effects and others consistency effects. Two prior
meta-analyses attempted to address these discrepancies, finding a small
effect (d = .31). However, a considerable amount of heterogeneity is still
unexplained. We theorize that methodological differences between studies
moderate the effect. Applying reputation-based theory, we predicted that
(1) individuals who were observed during licensing would be more moral and
produce a larger licensing effect, and (2) dependent measures that make it
easy to infer reputation (good/bad) would have smaller licensing effects.
We provide a brand-new meta-analysis of 116 studies (k = 157, N > 10,000)
that tests moderators. We found a larger licensing effect when participants
were explicitly observed (d = .56) than when they were not (d = .12). There
was a larger licensing effect when dependent measures were highly morally
ambiguous (d = .35) than less ambiguous (ds < .20), which supported our
predictions. Overall, the licensing effect was much smaller than previously
reported (d = .17).