The dangers of behavioural breadcrumbing
When a single good deed softens a pattern of self-interest, and why that matters for power and equality.
A while ago, I met a fairly well-known person at a wedding and tried to make small talk. He looked at me, scanned the room, spotted someone much more important and interesting to talk to, and quickly made his excuses. I was slightly wounded but soon forgot about it! A year or so later, I unexpectedly bumped into him again at a party. This time, he made a beeline for me. I sensed there was no one else available to talk to. He then spoke about himself and his achievements for the best part of an hour before I made my excuses and left. During the conversation, the only questions he asked were the kind designed to establish his authority and importance over me.
It is obviously the height of bad manners to comment on someone else’s manners. But I knew the hosts well enough to subsequently ask what they thought about him. “Yes,” they said, “he is really arrogant, but he was so nice to me when my mother died.”
And that seemed to matter disproportionately. That single act of kindness appeared to outweigh the pattern, softening what might otherwise have been seen as simple self-importance, reframing the rest. In dating, this is known as ‘breadcrumbing’, offering just enough warmth or attention to keep someone engaged without changing the broader pattern of inattention and lack of care. We will borrow that term (and call it ‘behavioural breadcrumbing) to describe this phenomenon outside of the dating context.
This is a curious phenomenon and surely carries much wider implications than it might first appear. What might look like a small bias in how we judge people can also be a much wider pattern in how we evaluate power, allowing moments of kindness or warmth to reassure us over the wider (and arguably more important) patterns that likely demand accountability.
Leaders who govern in an unpleasant manner but appear kind or empathetic at key moments can retain legitimacy or be forgiven after a carefully timed act of compassion. The issue is not that such gestures are necessarily fake but that they are deemed enough. And this means that policy fades into the background and that performance comes to the front.
The behavioural science of breadcrumbing
So what explains this pattern? Arguably, the dynamic is based on contrast effects in the social nature of perception, which suggests we do not look at personality traits in isolation but instead compare behaviour against expectations and the surrounding context. When someone who seems self-absorbed performs a kind act, it stands out precisely because it is unexpected. And once it feels meaningful, it can have a halo effect on how we see the person, as we treat the good act as evidence of their ‘true’ character. If a self-centred colleague publicly supports a junior at a key moment, we don’t just register the gesture, but we start to create a wider narrative about that person. In other words, we think, ‘If they can do that, they must be fundamentally decent.’
Acts that appear costly, whether through acts of generosity, artistic creation, or some form of sacrifice, are also often read as especially revealing of character. Research on signalling suggests that when people incur visible effort, we tend to treat it as evidence of sincerity and trustworthiness. Public generosity in particular can enhance status and reputation, as we tend to interpret it as proof of underlying virtue.
How this plays out culturally
Arguably we can see how this works at a cultural level in the film adaptation of Maggie O’Farrell’s Hamnet. William Shakespeare is portrayed as largely absent from the domestic sphere, while Agnes carries the daily weight of childcare. Agnes is not unreasonably angry about his absence from domestic labour, reflecting the way that domestic and emotional labour are essential but undervalued.
When their son dies, Agnes is struck down with grief, but Shakespeare continues to be absent. We subsequently discover he has been writing Hamlet, presented as a highly emotionally charged processing of the grief of his son’s death. Shown in a public forum this play appears emotionally costly and culturally transformative. Grief is converted into art, something that looks demanding and visibly ‘expensive’, thereby acquiring a moral significance.
And that imbalance travels well beyond the story and Hamnet: work that produces visible artefacts, measurable outcomes or cultural prestige is easier to narrate as sacrifice. It appears intentional, effortful and transformative. By contrast, the steady work of supporting others is often treated as ordinary, even though it is foundational.
The gendered nature of breadcrumbing
There is a highly gendered dimension to this pattern of course. Visible achievement to which moral credit is attached has historically been more accessible to men. By contrast, the labour of care has more often fallen to women. The domestic and emotional labour sustains households, organisations and institutions, but rarely attracts recognition in the way that public achievement does.
This means that occasional but public and symbolically resonant acts will overlook the background, ‘hidden’ work that makes it possible in the first place. The question is not whether kindness or creative achievement matter but whether we are willing to examine the standards by which we assign value and whose work those standards quietly privilege.
Implications for behavioural science
For behavioural change work, the implications are surely that if visible gestures carry disproportionate weight, then symbolic acts may well be mistaken for substantive change. Public commitments, empathetic speeches or one-off initiatives can generate reputational credit that outpaces underlying behaviour.
This creates a risk in many settings, but particularly organisational ones. Leaders may receive recognition for isolated displays of virtue, but the everyday reality for those affected by their decisions remains unchanged. And this distortion is not neutral as public statements and visible leadership have historically been more accessible to men. By contrast, the labour of actually maintaining culture and sustaining continuity has more often fallen to women and is less likely to generate moral credit.
The behavioural challenge, then, is not to produce more moments, but to reshape patterns. Effective behaviour change depends on structural support. And this means designing environments in which sustained conduct, including the often invisible work of care and maintenance, accrues recognition and status, if we wish to avoid behavioural breadcrumbing.