By Tage Shakti Rai and Alan Page Fiske
Psychological Review
2011, Vol. 118, No. 1, 57–75
Abstract
Genuine moral disagreement exists and is widespread. To understand such disagreement, we must examine the basic kinds of social relationships people construct across cultures and the distinct moral obligations and prohibitions these relationships entail. We extend relational models theory (Fiske, 1991) to identify 4 fundamental and distinct moral motives. Unity is the motive to care for and support the integrity of in-groups by avoiding or eliminating threats of contamination and providing aid and protection based on need or empathic compassion. Hierarchy is the motive to respect rank in social groups where superiors are entitled to deference and respect but must also lead, guide, direct, and protect subordinates. Equality is the motive for balanced, in-kind reciprocity, equal treatment, equal say, and equal opportunity. Proportionality is the motive for rewards and punishments to be proportionate to merit, benefits to be calibrated to contributions, and judgments to be based on a utilitarian calculus of costs and benefits. The 4 moral motives are universal, but cultures, ideologies, and individuals differ in where they activate these motives and how they implement them. Unlike existing theories (Haidt, 2007; Hauser, 2006; Turiel, 1983), relationship regulation theory predicts that any action, including violence, unequal treatment, and “impure” acts, may be perceived as morally correct depending on the moral motive employed and how the relevant social relationship is construed. This approach facilitates clearer
understanding of moral perspectives we disagree with and provides a template for how to influence moral motives and practices in the world.
The entire article is here.
Monday, September 30, 2013
‘Everyday Sadists’ Among Us
By Jan Hoffman
The New York Times
Originally published September 16, 2013
Here is an excerpt:
Those who enjoy inflicting at least moderate pain on others, directly or vicariously, mingle with us daily. Think mean girls, taunting a classmate to commit suicide. Or the professor who grills a squirming, clueless student, lips curled in a small, savage smile.
Delroy L. Paulhus, a psychology professor at the University of British Columbia, calls such people “everyday sadists.”
“They exist on a spectrum,” he said. “It could be at a hockey game and your guy is pummeling the opponent into hamburger and people are standing up having orgasms, to taking revenge on those you think deserve it, to schadenfreude.”
But acknowledging that sadists regularly cross our paths is unsettling, said Scott O. Lilienfeld, a professor of psychology at Emory University, who studies personality disorders. “We prefer to think, ‘There’s sadists, and then there’s the rest of us.’ ”
The entire story is here.
The New York Times
Originally published September 16, 2013
Here is an excerpt:
Those who enjoy inflicting at least moderate pain on others, directly or vicariously, mingle with us daily. Think mean girls, taunting a classmate to commit suicide. Or the professor who grills a squirming, clueless student, lips curled in a small, savage smile.
Delroy L. Paulhus, a psychology professor at the University of British Columbia, calls such people “everyday sadists.”
“They exist on a spectrum,” he said. “It could be at a hockey game and your guy is pummeling the opponent into hamburger and people are standing up having orgasms, to taking revenge on those you think deserve it, to schadenfreude.”
But acknowledging that sadists regularly cross our paths is unsettling, said Scott O. Lilienfeld, a professor of psychology at Emory University, who studies personality disorders. “We prefer to think, ‘There’s sadists, and then there’s the rest of us.’ ”
The entire story is here.
Sunday, September 29, 2013
Can Emotional Intelligence Be Taught?
By Jennifer Kahn
The New York Times
Originally published September 15, 2013
Here is an excerpt:
For children, Brackett notes, school is an emotional caldron: a constant stream of academic and social challenges that can generate feelings ranging from loneliness to euphoria. Educators and parents have long assumed that a child’s ability to cope with such stresses is either innate — a matter of temperament — or else acquired “along the way,” in the rough and tumble of ordinary interaction. But in practice, Brackett says, many children never develop those crucial skills. “It’s like saying that a child doesn’t need to study English because she talks with her parents at home,” Brackett told me last spring. “Emotional skills are the same. A teacher might say, ‘Calm down!’ — but how exactly do you calm down when you’re feeling anxious? Where do you learn the skills to manage those feelings?”
A growing number of educators and psychologists now believe that the answer to that question is in school. George Lucas’s Edutopia foundation has lobbied for the teaching of social and emotional skills for the past decade; the State of Illinois passed a bill in 2003 making “social and emotional learning” a part of school curriculums. Thousands of schools now use one of the several dozen programs, including Brackett’s own, that have been approved as “evidence-based” by the Collaborative for Academic, Social and Emotional Learning, a Chicago-based nonprofit. All told, there are now tens of thousands of emotional-literacy programs running in cities nationwide.
The theory that kids need to learn to manage their emotions in order to reach their potential grew out of the research of a pair of psychology professors — John Mayer, at the University of New Hampshire, and Peter Salovey, at Yale.
The entire story is here.
The New York Times
Originally published September 15, 2013
Here is an excerpt:
For children, Brackett notes, school is an emotional caldron: a constant stream of academic and social challenges that can generate feelings ranging from loneliness to euphoria. Educators and parents have long assumed that a child’s ability to cope with such stresses is either innate — a matter of temperament — or else acquired “along the way,” in the rough and tumble of ordinary interaction. But in practice, Brackett says, many children never develop those crucial skills. “It’s like saying that a child doesn’t need to study English because she talks with her parents at home,” Brackett told me last spring. “Emotional skills are the same. A teacher might say, ‘Calm down!’ — but how exactly do you calm down when you’re feeling anxious? Where do you learn the skills to manage those feelings?”
A growing number of educators and psychologists now believe that the answer to that question is in school. George Lucas’s Edutopia foundation has lobbied for the teaching of social and emotional skills for the past decade; the State of Illinois passed a bill in 2003 making “social and emotional learning” a part of school curriculums. Thousands of schools now use one of the several dozen programs, including Brackett’s own, that have been approved as “evidence-based” by the Collaborative for Academic, Social and Emotional Learning, a Chicago-based nonprofit. All told, there are now tens of thousands of emotional-literacy programs running in cities nationwide.
The theory that kids need to learn to manage their emotions in order to reach their potential grew out of the research of a pair of psychology professors — John Mayer, at the University of New Hampshire, and Peter Salovey, at Yale.
The entire story is here.
New rules for doctors ensuring data confidentiality
British Medical Association
Originally published September 13, 2013
Doctors will be asked to abide by new rules for keeping confidential patient data safe.
The government yesterday published its final response to a review into the way information is handled in and by the NHS, alongside new guidance from the HSCIC (Health and Social Care Information Centre).
The government accepted the recommendations of the review, chaired by Dame Fiona Caldicott, and stressed while information sharing was essential to provide good care for everyone, only the minimum amount of information should be shared and there must be strict rules to govern it.
Patients must also be given the right to object to having their identifiable data shared.
The entire article is here.
Originally published September 13, 2013
Doctors will be asked to abide by new rules for keeping confidential patient data safe.
The government yesterday published its final response to a review into the way information is handled in and by the NHS, alongside new guidance from the HSCIC (Health and Social Care Information Centre).
The government accepted the recommendations of the review, chaired by Dame Fiona Caldicott, and stressed while information sharing was essential to provide good care for everyone, only the minimum amount of information should be shared and there must be strict rules to govern it.
Patients must also be given the right to object to having their identifiable data shared.
The entire article is here.
Saturday, September 28, 2013
Perception of Addiction and Its Effects on One's Moral Responsibility
By Justin Caouette
AJOB Neuroscience
Volume 4, Issue 3, 2013
Addressing concerns about framing addiction as disease, authors (Hammer et. al 2013) argue that we should refrain from doing so as such a categorization may unfairly stigmatize the addict. They suggest that an analysis of disease metaphors bolsters their view, and the utility that could be had by labeling addiction as disease is outweighed by the potential disutility in doing so. Tolend support to their view they appeal to intuitions about the common folk‟s analysis of diseased individuals. Their claim is that a common understanding of disease unfairly depicts addicts as “wretches” or “sinners”. They use this as evidence in favor of rejecting the addiction -as-disease model. We argue that the author‟s metaphoric framing of how common folks often view diseased individuals is misguided for a number of reasons. We focus on three points of contention.
The entire piece is here.
AJOB Neuroscience
Volume 4, Issue 3, 2013
Addressing concerns about framing addiction as disease, authors (Hammer et. al 2013) argue that we should refrain from doing so as such a categorization may unfairly stigmatize the addict. They suggest that an analysis of disease metaphors bolsters their view, and the utility that could be had by labeling addiction as disease is outweighed by the potential disutility in doing so. Tolend support to their view they appeal to intuitions about the common folk‟s analysis of diseased individuals. Their claim is that a common understanding of disease unfairly depicts addicts as “wretches” or “sinners”. They use this as evidence in favor of rejecting the addiction -as-disease model. We argue that the author‟s metaphoric framing of how common folks often view diseased individuals is misguided for a number of reasons. We focus on three points of contention.
The entire piece is here.
Girl’s Suicide Points to Rise in Apps Used by Cyberbullies
By LIZETTE ALVAREZ
The New York Times
Published: September 13, 2013
Here is an excerpt:
In jumping, Rebecca became one of the youngest members of a growing list of children and teenagers apparently driven to suicide, at least in part, after being maligned, threatened and taunted online, mostly through a new collection of texting and photo-sharing cellphone applications. Her suicide raises new questions about the proliferation and popularity of these applications and Web sites among children and the ability of parents to keep up with their children’s online relationships.
For more than a year, Rebecca, pretty and smart, was cyberbullied by a coterie of 15 middle-school children who urged her to kill herself, her mother said.
The entire story is here.
The New York Times
Published: September 13, 2013
Here is an excerpt:
In jumping, Rebecca became one of the youngest members of a growing list of children and teenagers apparently driven to suicide, at least in part, after being maligned, threatened and taunted online, mostly through a new collection of texting and photo-sharing cellphone applications. Her suicide raises new questions about the proliferation and popularity of these applications and Web sites among children and the ability of parents to keep up with their children’s online relationships.
For more than a year, Rebecca, pretty and smart, was cyberbullied by a coterie of 15 middle-school children who urged her to kill herself, her mother said.
The entire story is here.
Friday, September 27, 2013
'Love Hormone' May Play Wider Role in Social Interaction Than Previously Thought
Science Daily
Originally published September 11, 2013
Researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine have shown that oxytocin -- often referred to as "the love hormone" because of its importance in the formation and maintenance of strong mother-child and sexual attachments -- is involved in a broader range of social interactions than previously understood.
The discovery may have implications for neurological disorders such as autism, as well as for scientific conceptions of our evolutionary heritage.
Scientists estimate that the advent of social living preceded the emergence of pair living by 35 million years. The new study suggests that oxytocin's role in one-on-one bonding probably evolved from an existing, broader affinity for group living.
The entire article is here.
Originally published September 11, 2013
Researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine have shown that oxytocin -- often referred to as "the love hormone" because of its importance in the formation and maintenance of strong mother-child and sexual attachments -- is involved in a broader range of social interactions than previously understood.
The discovery may have implications for neurological disorders such as autism, as well as for scientific conceptions of our evolutionary heritage.
Scientists estimate that the advent of social living preceded the emergence of pair living by 35 million years. The new study suggests that oxytocin's role in one-on-one bonding probably evolved from an existing, broader affinity for group living.
The entire article is here.
The Drug Made Me Do It: An Examination of the Prozac Defense
By J. Marshall
The Neuroethics Blog
Originally posted September 10, 2013
The plot of a recent Hollywood thriller, Side Effects, revolves around many pressing legal and ethical questions surrounding the use of anti-depressant medications. The movie explores the life of a supposedly depressed woman—Emily Taylor—who seeks treatment from her psychiatrist. Emily’s doctor prescribes her an anti-depressant—Ablixa. Emily then proceeds to murder her husband in cold blood while under the influence of the drug. The movie seeks to explore the culpability of this depressed woman in a legal sense. During the trial, the psychiatrist argues that neither he nor Emily Taylor is responsible; rather, Emily Taylor was simply “a hopeless victim of circumstance and biology.” Is it possible that a drug could be responsible for one’s actions as argued by the psychiatrist in the movie? The answer is not clear. Nonetheless, the possibility that someone could escape criminal punishment due to a certain anti-depressant represents a serious ethical quandary that should be examined.
The entire blog post is here.
The Neuroethics Blog
Originally posted September 10, 2013
The plot of a recent Hollywood thriller, Side Effects, revolves around many pressing legal and ethical questions surrounding the use of anti-depressant medications. The movie explores the life of a supposedly depressed woman—Emily Taylor—who seeks treatment from her psychiatrist. Emily’s doctor prescribes her an anti-depressant—Ablixa. Emily then proceeds to murder her husband in cold blood while under the influence of the drug. The movie seeks to explore the culpability of this depressed woman in a legal sense. During the trial, the psychiatrist argues that neither he nor Emily Taylor is responsible; rather, Emily Taylor was simply “a hopeless victim of circumstance and biology.” Is it possible that a drug could be responsible for one’s actions as argued by the psychiatrist in the movie? The answer is not clear. Nonetheless, the possibility that someone could escape criminal punishment due to a certain anti-depressant represents a serious ethical quandary that should be examined.
The entire blog post is here.
Thursday, September 26, 2013
Strengthening Global Privacy & Free Expression Rights in the Age of Surveillance
by Emma Llansó
Center for Democracy and Technology
September 10, 2013
During this summer of surveillance, debate in the United States has focused mainly on the extent to which the NSA’s surveillance programs infringed on the privacy of people inside the U.S. Under the now-notorious PRISM program, the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) requires U.S.-based companies to disclose the communications of non-U.S. citizens located outside the U.S. In defense of the program, U.S. government officials have stressed that it only targets non-U.S. citizens outside the U.S., but people across the globe who get swept up in the NSA’s programs have privacy rights too. CDT has joined human rights advocates from around the world to highlight this issue to the UN Human Rights Council, the U.S. Congress, and the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board.
The entire article is here.
Center for Democracy and Technology
September 10, 2013
During this summer of surveillance, debate in the United States has focused mainly on the extent to which the NSA’s surveillance programs infringed on the privacy of people inside the U.S. Under the now-notorious PRISM program, the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) requires U.S.-based companies to disclose the communications of non-U.S. citizens located outside the U.S. In defense of the program, U.S. government officials have stressed that it only targets non-U.S. citizens outside the U.S., but people across the globe who get swept up in the NSA’s programs have privacy rights too. CDT has joined human rights advocates from around the world to highlight this issue to the UN Human Rights Council, the U.S. Congress, and the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board.
The entire article is here.
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