scholarly journals When the killing has been done: Influences of personality on third-party judgment and punishment of homicides in moral dilemma scenarios

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexander Behnke ◽  
Anja Strobel ◽  
Diana Armbruster
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Moral Dilemma ◽  
Need For Cognition ◽  
Third Party ◽  
Moral Decision ◽  
Moral Decision Making ◽  
Interindividual Differences ◽  
Understanding Emotions ◽  
Complex Scenario ◽  
Sense Of Justice

Killing people is universally considered reprehensible and evokes in observers a need to punish perpetrators. To investigate how observers’ personality influences their cognitive, emotional, and punishing reactions towards perpetrators, we analyzed data from 1,004 participants who responded to three scenarios describing deliberate killings from a third-party perspective. Utilitarian motive of killing and inevitability of harm varied systematically between scenarios. Participants’ moral appropriateness judgments, emotions towards perpetrators, and assigned punishments revealed complex scenario-personality interactions. Trait psychopathy led to more understanding emotions but harsher punishments in all scenarios. Regarding utilitarian killings, need for cognition led to milder punishments, whereas intuitive/authority-obedient thinking led to stronger negative emotions and harsher punishments. Other-oriented empathy, trait anxiety, and justice sensitivity did not account for differences in third-party punishments. Our findings highlight the importance of interindividual differences on moral decision making and sense of justice.

scholarly journals Intermediation Reduces Punishment (and Reward)

2011 ◽  
Vol 3 (4) ◽  
pp. 77-106 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lucas C Coffman
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Charitable Giving ◽  
Laboratory Experiments ◽  
Third Party ◽  
Moral Decision ◽  
Separate Study ◽  
Moral Decision Making

This paper shows moral decision making is not well predicted by the overall fairness of an act but rather by the fairness of the consequences that follow directly. In laboratory experiments, third-party punishment for keeping money from a poorer player decreases when an intermediary actor is included in the transaction. This is true for completely passive intermediaries, even though intermediation decreases the payout of the poorest player and hurts equity, and because intermediation distances the transgressor from the outcome. A separate study shows rewards of charitable giving decrease when the saliency of an intermediary is increased. (JEL A13, D63, D64)

Paradoxical Effects of Power on Moral Thinking: Why Power Both Increases and Decreases Deontological and Utilitarian Moral Decisions

2017 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 110-120 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexandra Fleischmann ◽  
Joris Lammers ◽  
Paul Conway ◽  
Adam D. Galinsky
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Moral Dilemma ◽  
Thinking Styles ◽  
Moral Decision ◽  
Moral Decision Making ◽  
Moral Orientation ◽  
Moral Thinking ◽  
Moral Decisions ◽  
Systematic Effects ◽  
Orientation Scale

The current research explores the role of power in moral decision-making. Some work suggests that power increases utilitarianism; other work suggests power increases deontological judgments. Conversely, we propose that power can both increase and decrease both deontological and utilitarian decisions by building on two recent insights in moral psychology. First, we utilize the moral orientation scale to assess four thinking styles that jointly predict moral dilemma decisions. Second, we employ process dissociation to assess deontological and utilitarian judgments as orthogonal rather than opposite constructs. We conducted two preregistered confirmatory studies that replicated exploratory findings. In Study 1, power increased three moral thinking styles: integration, deliberation, and rule orientation. In Study 2, these decision-making styles simultaneously mediated the effects of power on utilitarian and deontological responses in opposing ways, leading to null effects overall. These results reconcile previous findings and demonstrate the complex yet systematic effects power has on moral decision-making.

Islam and Assisted Reproduction

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marcia C. Inhorn
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Assisted Reproduction ◽  
Middle Eastern ◽  
Third Party ◽  
Moral Decision ◽  
Gamete Donation ◽  
Clinical Practices ◽  
Moral Decision Making ◽  
Muslim Countries

This chapter demonstrates how major divergences have occurred in the fatwas being issued by Sunni and Shia religious authorities regarding the permissibility of third-party reproductive assistance. In recent years, new fatwas emerging from the Shia world have condoned third-party gamete donation, whereas gamete donation continues to be banned across the Sunni Muslim countries. These divergent Sunni and Shia Islamic approaches toward gamete donation have affected the moral decision making of infertile Muslim couples in ways that are only beginning to be realized. The degree of consensus across the Sunni Muslim countries is quite striking, as are the ways in which these fatwas have guided the clinical practices of the Middle Eastern IVF community.

scholarly journals Who cares about the outgroup? Political ideology, empathy, and moral decision-making

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arathy Puthillam ◽  
Hansika Kapoor
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Political Ideology ◽  
Moral Dilemma ◽  
Hierarchical Structures ◽  
Moral Dilemmas ◽  
Reactivity Index ◽  
Moral Decision ◽  
Moral Decision Making ◽  
Group Setting ◽  
Moral Decisions

Conservatives are known to display smaller moral circles, have less empathy, and make utilitarian decisions. The present study aimed to understand the relationships between political ideology and empathetic concern (n = 513), and between ideology and moral decision-making (n = 210) in an inter-group setting, using an Indian sample. We measured trait empathetic concern and empathetic concern for the ingroup (i.e., their own religion) and outgroup (i.e., Muslims) using the Interpersonal Reactivity Index, and measured moral decision-making for a non-denominational group and in- and out-group using modified moral dilemmas. We found that right-leaning individuals, in terms of greater adherence to cultural norms, displayed higher levels of trait empathetic concern, as well as that for in- and outgroups; they were also more willing to sacrifice the outgroup to save multiple ingroup members in moral dilemma tasks, and thus made utilitarian moral decisions when sacrificing outgroup lives were concerned. Additionally, those leaning left, in terms of lower adherence to hierarchical structures, showed higher levels of empathetic concern for the outgroup. Implications and future avenues are discussed.

scholarly journals Somatic Marker Production Deficits Do Not Explain the Relationship between Psychopathic Traits and Utilitarian Moral Decision Making

2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (5) ◽  
pp. 303
Author(s):  
Shawn E. Fagan ◽  
Liat Kofler ◽  
Sarah Riccio ◽  
Yu Gao
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Moral Dilemma ◽  
Skin Conductance Level ◽  
Moral Dilemmas ◽  
Psychopathic Traits ◽  
Moral Decision ◽  
Moral Decision Making ◽  
Somatic Marker ◽  
College Population ◽  
The Relationship

In moral dilemma tasks, high levels of psychopathic traits often predict increased utilitarian responding—specifically, endorsing sacrificing one person to save many. Research suggests that increased arousal (i.e., somatic marker production) underlies lower rates of utilitarian responding during moral dilemmas. Though deficient somatic marker production is characteristic of psychopathy, how this deficit affects the psychopathy–utilitarian connection remains unknown. We assessed psychopathic traits in undergraduates, as well as behavioral performance and skin conductance level reactivity (SCL-R; a measure of somatic marker production) during a moral dilemma task. High psychopathic traits and low SCL-R were associated with increased utilitarian decisions in dilemmas involving direct personal harm. Psychopathic traits were unrelated to SCL-R, nor did SCL-R mediate the relationship between psychopathy and utilitarianism. The present study did not find evidence that somatic marker production explains the connection between utilitarianism and psychopathy in a college population. Further research is necessary to identify the neural mechanisms relating psychopathy and moral decision-making in nonclinical samples.

scholarly journals Theory of Mind and Moral Decision-Making in the Context of Autism Spectrum Disorder

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jessica Ellen Ringshaw ◽  
Katie Hamilton ◽  
Susan Malcolm-Smith
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Autism Spectrum Disorder ◽  
Theory Of Mind ◽  
Cognitive Empathy ◽  
Autism Spectrum ◽  
Spectrum Disorder ◽  
Social Impairment ◽  
Third Party ◽  
Moral Decision ◽  
Moral Decision Making

AbstractSocial impairment in Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) has been linked to Theory of Mind (ToM) deficits. However, little research has investigated the relationship between ToM and moral decision-making in children with ASD. This study compared moral decision-making and ToM between aggregate-matched ASD and neurotypical boys (n=38 per group; aged 6-12). In a third-party resource allocation task manipulating recipient merit, wealth and health, neurotypical children allocated significantly more resources to the morally deserving recipient, suggesting equitable allocation. A comparatively larger portion of the ASD group allocated equally. ToM emerged as a predictor of moral decision-making. We suggest that ToM (cognitive empathy) deficits may underly atypical moral decision-making in ASD by limiting the integration of empathic arousal (affective empathy) with moral information.

scholarly journals The Role of Temperature in Moral Decision-Making: Limited Reproducibility

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ryunosuke Sudo ◽  
Satoshi F. Nakashima ◽  
Masatoshi Ukezono ◽  
Yuji Takano ◽  
Johan Lauwereyns
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Social Cognition ◽  
Temperature Effect ◽  
Moral Dilemma ◽  
Strong Support ◽  
Judgment Task ◽  
Cool Temperature ◽  
Moral Decision ◽  
Moral Decision Making

Temperature is one of the major environmental factors that people are exposed to on a daily basis, often in conditions that do not afford control. It is known that heat and cold can influence a person’s productivity and performance in simple tasks. With respect to social cognition, it has also been suggested that temperature impacts on relatively high-level forms of decision-making. For instance, previous research demonstrated that cold temperature promotes utilitarian judgment in a moral dilemma task. This effect could be due to psychological processing, when a cool temperature primes a set of internal representations (associated with “coldness”). Alternatively, the promotion of utilitarian judgment in cold conditions could be due to physiological interference from temperature, impeding on social cognition. Refuting both explanations of psychological or physiological processing, however, it has been suggested that there may be problems of reproducibility in the literature on temperature modulating complex or abstract information processing. To examine the role of temperature in moral decision-making, we conducted a series of experiments using ambient and haptic temperature with careful manipulation checks and modified task methodology. Experiment 1 manipulated room temperature with cool (21°C), control (24°C) and hot (27°C) conditions and found only a cool temperature effect, promoting utilitarian judgment as in the previous study. Experiment 2 manipulated the intensity of haptic temperature but failed to obtain the cool temperature effect. Experiments 3 and 4 examined the generalizability of the cool ambient temperature effect with another moral judgment task and with manipulation of exposure duration. However, again there were no cool temperature effects, suggesting a lack of reproducibility. Despite successful manipulations of temperature in all four experiments, as measured in body temperature and the participants’ self-reported perception, we found no systematic influence of temperature on moral decision-making. A Bayesian meta-analysis of the four experiments showed that the overall data tended to provide strong support in favor of the null hypothesis. We propose that, at least in the range of temperatures from 21 to 27°C, the cool temperature effect in moral decision-making is not a robust phenomenon.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document