A recent study conducted by the University of Toronto, revealed that washing your hands after impure thoughts pop up in your mind can cleanse your mind of guilt at a subconscious level emphasizing the fact that Physical and moral purity are correlated.
This phenomenon is termed as the “Mac Beth effect”, after Lady Mac Beth of the famous Shakespeare play who tries to wash her hands following the murder of King Duncan with the hope that little water would suffice in cleansing her conscience along with the imaginary blood stains on her hand.
The study was conducted by Chen-Bo Zhong of the University of Toronto in Ontario, and Katie Liljenquist of Northwestern University in Chicago.
The study was conducted on about 170 undergraduate students who were asked to take into consideration either ethical or unethical deeds from their pasts while participating in a word completion exercise.
The researchers found out that the participants who thought of unethical or impure thoughts or actions were more likely to interpret W_ _ H, S _ _ P as Wash and Soap respectively compared to those who focused on moral and ethical thoughts.
Another exercise involved a selection of a gift out of hand wipes and pencils that were offered to the participants. It was found out that 67 per cent of people, the ones who recollected immoral thoughts or deeds, chose hand-wipes as their gift, on the hand; pencil was the preferred gift for the ethical thinkers.
"What we found is that, after an individual has been morally challenged, there is an increased need to cleanse. And this reflects in their preference for cleansing products over non-cleansing products" Zhong said.
"Daily hygiene routines such as washing hands, as simple and benign as they may seem, can deliver a powerful antidote to threatened morality," he added.
The study was published today in the journal Science.
