New study finds link between receptivity to “corporate bullshit” and weaker leadership skills

People who are more impressed by buzzword-heavy “corporate speak” tend to perform worse on measures of workplace leadership and decision-making, according to a new study published in Personality & Individual Differences.

Many workplaces rely heavily on jargon-filled communication, phrases such as “growth hacking,” or drilling down one more click.” Although such language may sound sophisticated, researchers have increasingly questioned whether it actually improves communication or instead obscures meaning.

Researchers studying “bullshit receptivity” define it as the tendency to evaluate vague or misleading statements as profound, insightful, or informative even when they contain little substance. Previous research has linked receptivity to various kinds of misleading or pseudo-profound language with weaker analytic thinking and poorer reasoning.

Shane Littrell, a postdoctoral research associate at Cornell University, set out to examine this phenomenon specifically in corporate environments. Littrell explained that the idea for the research grew from his own professional experience: “I used to work in a corporate environment and hated it so much that I eventually switched careers.”

As he described it, “One of the more frustrating aspects was the confusing way the ‘higher ups’ would talk to everyone.” For example, he recalled that “one of my bosses loved to use words like ‘synergizing,’ ‘derivation,’ and ‘optimal flow-through’ in ways that didn’t make coherent sense. He also loved to say that we would ‘download on’ a topic rather than ‘discuss’ or ‘talk about’ it.”

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“It was so aggravating because I couldn’t understand why he didn’t just talk like a normal person,” Littrell said.

“The way executives often spoke probably sounded impressive (at least to them) but made actual communication much more difficult for everyone else.” Because so many people encounter this type of messaging in organizations, he argued that the topic deserves systematic scientific investigation. As he put it, “hundreds of millions of people have to deal with these types of organizations every day because they either work for them or consume their products or both.”

The research included four studies with a combined sample of 1,018 working adults from the United States and Canada, recruited through online research platforms. Participants evaluated a series of corporate-style statements. Some of these statements were genuine quotes from business leaders, while others were generated using an algorithm that assembled corporate buzzwords into sentences that sounded plausible but were essentially meaningless. Participants rated how much “business savvy” was expressed by each statement on a 5-point scale ranging from “No business savvy at all” to “A great deal of business savvy.”

Responses from the first study were used to create the Corporate Bullshit Receptivity Scale (CBSR), a new measure designed to capture how strongly people perceive jargon-heavy corporate statements as “business savvy.” In later studies, Littrell validated the scale by comparing it with a variety of other measures.

Participants completed tests of analytic thinking and reasoning, including the Cognitive Reflection Test and measures of fluid intelligence, as well as scales assessing open-minded thinking and receptivity to other forms of misleading language. They also completed measures relevant to workplace functioning, such as ratings of leadership qualities, job satisfaction, trust in supervisors, responses to corporate mission statements, and situational judgment tasks designed to measure decision-making in workplace scenarios.

Littrell emphasized that receptivity to misleading language can depend heavily on context. As he explained, “One of the most important issues that this work highlights is that ‘bullshit receptivity’ is highly contextual, so it’s inappropriate for researchers to use any scale in a ‘one size fits all’ kind of way. This makes sense when you consider how bullshit receptivity functions in the real world.

“For example, a business professional might think that New Age claims about ‘transcendent consciousness’ and ‘vibrational energies’ are really stupid (i.e., they have low receptivity to pseudo-profound BS). But, when they get to work the next day, they fall for all kinds of misleading claims that are wrapped up in buzzwords like ‘blue-sky-thinking’ and ‘customer differentiated value proposition’ (i.e., they have high receptivity to corporate BS).”

“The bottom line is that almost anyone can fall for bullshit when it’s packaged to appeal to their specific expertise, interests, or biases.”

Across the studies, Littrell found that individuals differed significantly in how impressed they were by corporate buzzword statements. Those with higher corporate-bullshit receptivity scores were more likely to view jargon-heavy statements as insightful or indicative of business expertise. They were also more likely to engage in persuasive “bullshitting” themselves, using exaggerated or misleading language to impress others.

At the same time, higher receptivity was associated with lower scores on measures of analytic thinking and fluid intelligence, suggesting that individuals who were more impressed by corporate jargon were also less likely to critically evaluate information.

The research also revealed important workplace implications. Individuals with higher corporate-bullshit receptivity were more likely to find corporate mission statements inspiring and to perceive their supervisors as charismatic or transformational leaders. However, these same individuals performed worse on situational judgment tasks designed to measure workplace leadership and decision-making ability. Corporate-bullshit receptivity was the strongest predictor of poorer performance on these decision-making tasks, even after accounting for other variables.

Littrell explained why this matters for organizations. “Confusing, buzzword-heavy ‘corporate speak’ isn’t merely annoying or frustrating, it can actually be harmful. Some workplace language that might sound smart and strategic, at least on a superficial level, is what I call ‘functionally misleading’ (it can mislead the audience regardless of the speaker’s intentions).”

Because people differ in how persuasive they find such language, these differences can have real consequences. “People who are more impressed – that is, they have higher corporate-bullshit receptivity – perform worse on measures of workplace leadership and decision-making. So, ‘corporate bullshit’ can backfire because, regardless of what the speaker intended, it can distort whether the audience clearly and accurately understands the goals, feedback, or decisions that are communicated to them. This not only can impair employee performance and career advancement but potentially lead to reputational and financial costs for organizations as well.”

The author cautions that although the Corporate Bullshit Receptivity Scale is a promising research tool, it is not yet ready for high-stakes uses such as employee screening or hiring decisions. Additional work is also needed to test the scale in different cultures and languages where the concept of “bullshit” may be interpreted differently.

“The next steps will focus on stronger tests of real-world validation like collecting data in specific companies and comparing employee receptivity scores to objective company metrics (e.g., sales goals, performance ratings from direct supervisors),” Littrell told PsyPost.

“We also need a deeper understanding of how context influences receptivity because things like speaker authority, status, and delivery style may amplify (or nullify) the effectiveness of bullshit and bullshitting in workplace settings.”

Overall, the findings suggest that impressive-sounding corporate jargon may do more than irritate employees—it might also influence how effectively people evaluate information and make decisions at work.

As Littrell advised, people should remain cautious when encountering impressive-sounding organizational language. “Depending on the context, almost any of us can be easily fooled by impressive-sounding language. It’s kind of a cognitive trap. So, if a message feels ‘smart’ or otherwise impressive but you can’t explain what evidence would support it – or even paraphrase it into a straightforward, concrete claim – you’re probably being influenced by the message’s packaging rather than its actual content.”

“So, whether you’re an employee or a consumer, if you come across any type of organizational messaging (e.g., from a company’s business leaders, public reports, mission statements, advertising, etc.), ask yourself, ‘What is the concrete claim here?’ ‘Does it make sense?’ and ‘Does the evidence actually support it?’ because impressive-sounding buzzwords and jargon are often red flags that you’re being misled.”

Littrell also writes about these topics on his Substack, Bullshitology.

The research “The Corporate Bullshit Receptivity Scale: Development, validation, and associations with workplace outcomes” was authored by Shane Littrell.