Deconstructing moral character judgments

Abstract

People often make judgments of others’ moral character — an inferred moral essence that presumably predicts moral behavior. We first define moral character and explore why people make character judgments before outlining three key elements that drive character judgments: behavior (good vs. bad, norm violations, and deliberation), mind (intentions, explanations, capacities), and identity (appearance, social groups, and warmth). We also provide taxonomy of moral character that goes beyond simply good vs. evil. Drawing from the theory of dyadic morality, we outline a two-dimensional triangular space of character judgments (valence and strength/agency), with three key corners — heroes, villains, and victims. Varieties of perceived moral character include saints and demons, strivers/sinners and opportunists, the nonmoral, virtuous, and culpable victims, and pure victims.