In his book, Predictably Irrational, MIT behavioral economist Dan Ariely describes a study he and colleagues conducted which found that recalling the Ten Commandments right before an exam discouraged students from cheating.

…what a miracle the Ten Commandments had wrought! We didn’t even remind our participants what the Commandments were - we just asked each participant to recall them (and almost none of the participants could recall all 10.) We hoped the exercise might evoke the idea of honesty among them. And this was clearly what it did.

Raising the question: could this kind of ethical conditioning help keep people honest in the workplace and public life?