A study, conducted by the University of Toronto and published in the journal Psychological Science, revealed that people tend to take refuge under darkness to get away with their wrong doings.

Even while wearing sunglasses, people assume that others are unaware of their deeds and hence they cannot be caught red handed.

Participants made to sit in a dimly or well-lit room were handed a brown envelope containing $10 along with one empty white envelope. A worksheet with 20 grids, comprising of 12 three-digit numbers each was given and the participants were supposed to find two numbers in each grid that added up to 10. The participants were asked to place the remainder of their money into the white envelope, at the end of the performance.

No difference in the actual performance was observed, but the participants who were seated in the slightly dim room had cheated more and thus ended up earning more undeserved money unscrupulously.

In the second experiment, where a participant had to allocate $6 between him and the recipient, those wearing sunglasses behaved selfishly.

Dr. Vanessa Bohns, who conducted the study said, "Across all three experiments, darkness had no bearing on actual anonymity, yet it still increased morally questionable behaviours".