Schadenfreude Caused by the Exposure of Hypocrisy in Others

Two studies examined whether and why seeing people suffer because of their hypocrisy can produce schadenfreude. Study 1 provided an initial demonstration of the phenomenon by showing that participants were indeed more pleased by learning that someone was caught for an immoral action when this person had criticized others for a similar action earlier. Study 2 showed that participants' schadenfreude was more intense when the immoral action matched precisely what the person had been criticizing others for doing earlier. Perceptions of hypocrisy consistently mediated the pattern of findings across the two studies. Perceptions of the deservingness of the misfortune and disgust over the hypocritical behavior also appeared to play mediational roles in explaining schadenfreude, though less consistently than perceptions of hypocrisy.