How stress influences our morality

By Lucius Caviola and Nadira Faulmüller

Academia.edu

Abstract

Several studies show that stress can influence moral judgment and behavior. In personal moral dilemmas—scenarios where someone has to be harmed by physical contact in order to save several others—participants under stress tend to make more deontological judgments than non-stressed participants, i.e. they agree less with harming someone for the greater good. Other studies demonstrate that stress can increase pro-social behavior for in-group members but decrease it for out-group members. The dual-process theory of moral judgment in combination with an evolutionary perspective on emotional reactions seems to explain these results: stress might inhibit controlled reasoning and trigger people’s automatic emotional intuitions. In other words, when it comes to morality, stress seems to make us prone to follow our gut reactions instead of our elaborate reasoning.

The entire paper is here.

How foreign language shapes moral judgment

By J. Geipel, C. Hadjichristidis, and L. Surian
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology
Volume 59, July 2015, Pages 8–17

Abstract

We investigated whether and how processing information in a foreign language as opposed to the native language affects moral judgments. Participants judged the moral wrongness of several private actions, such as consensual incest, that were depicted as harmless and presented in either the native or a foreign language. The use of a foreign language promoted less severe moral judgments and less confidence in them. Harmful and harmless social norm violations, such as saying a white lie to get a reduced fare, were also judged more leniently. The results do not support explanations based on facilitated deliberation, misunderstanding, or the adoption of a universalistic stance. We propose that the influence of foreign language is best explained by a reduced activation of social and moral norms when making moral judgments.

Highlights

• We investigated whether and how foreign language influences moral judgment.
• Foreign language prompted more lenient judgments for moral transgressions.
• Foreign language reduced confidence in people's moral evaluations.
• Violations of everyday norms were judged less harshly in a foreign language.
• Foreign language might act through a reduced activation of social and moral norms.

The entire article is here.

Varieties of Moral Emotional Experience

By Hanah A. Chapman and Adam K. Anderson
Emotion Review Vol. 3, No. 3 (July 2011) 255–257

Abstract

Although much research on emotion and morality has treated emotion as a relatively undifferentiated construct, recent work shows that moral transgressions can evoke a variety of distinct emotions. To accommodate these results, we propose a multiple-appraisal model in which distinct appraisals lead to different moral emotions. The implications of this model for our understanding of the
relationship between appraisals, emotions and judgments are discussed. The complexity of moral emotional experience presents a methodological challenge to researchers, but we submit that a complete understanding of human morality must acknowledge the differentiated nature of moral emotions.

The entire article is here.

On Disgust and Moral Judgment

By David Pizarro, Yoel Inbar, and Chelsea Helion
Emotion Review, Vol 3, No. 3 (July 2011), 267-268.

Abstract

Despite the wealth of recent work implicating disgust as an emotion central to human morality, the nature of the causal relationship between disgust and moral judgment remains unclear. We distinguish between three related claims regarding this relationship, and argue that the most interesting claim (that disgust is a moralizing emotion) is the one with the least empirical support.

The entire article is here.

Arrested development: early prefrontal lesions impair the maturation of moral judgement

By Bradley Taber-Thomas, Erik Asp, Michael Koenings, Matthew Sutterer, Steven Anderson, and Daniel Tranel
Brain (2014) 137 (4): 1254-1261 first published online February 11, 2014
doi: 10.1093/brain/awt377

Summary

Learning to make moral judgements based on considerations beyond self-interest is a fundamental aspect of moral development. A deficit in such learning is associated with poor socialization and criminal behaviour. The neural systems required for the acquisition and maturation of moral competency are not well understood. Here we show in a unique sample of neurological patients that focal lesions involving ventromedial prefrontal cortex, acquired during development, result in an abnormally egocentric pattern of moral judgement. In response to simple hypothetical moral scenarios, the patients were more likely than comparison participants to endorse self-interested actions that involved breaking moral rules or physically harming others in order to benefit themselves. This pattern (which we also found in subjects with psychopathy) differs from that of patients with adult-onset ventromedial prefrontal cortex lesions—the latter group showed normal rejection of egocentric rule violations. This novel contrast of patients with ventromedial prefrontal cortex lesions acquired during development versus during adulthood yields new evidence suggesting that the ventromedial prefrontal cortex is a critical neural substrate for the acquisition and maturation of moral competency that goes beyond self-interest to consider the welfare of others. Disruption to this affective neural system early in life interrupts moral development.

The article can be found here, behind a paywall.

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