Abstract
Objectives: The existing scales for moral judgment in sport have some limitations when used for cognitive neural research. Developing a set of experimental materials with good validity is thus warranted. The purpose of this study was to develop experimental materials that can be used in cognitive neuroscience research on moral judgment in sport.Design: Study 1 was a qualitative study and Study 2 used a within-subject design.Method: In Study 1, a qualitative method was adopted to assess types of moral misconduct among Chinese athletes, based on news reports of Chinese athletes' moral misconduct collected from the Internet and from interviews with Chinese elite athletes. In Study 2, typical examples were selected from a qualitative analysis based on the types of moral misconduct observed among athletes in Study 1. The examples were then compiled, controlled, and modified. The validity of the developed experimental materials was evaluated.Results: The moral misconduct observed in Chinese athletes can be divided into the following four categories: violent behavior, doping, match-fixing or tanking, and self-reported dishonesty. Subject analysis and item analysis consistently found that the experimental materials developed for moral judgment based on the four categories were significantly different in six aspects, including the rate of participants' agreement to the proposed resolution [FSubject(3, 184) = 236.60, p = 0.00; FItem(3, 156) = 471.17, p = 0.00], decision time [FSubject(3, 184) = 23.69, p = 0.00; FItem(3, 156) = 3.13, p = 0.03], moral conflict [FSubject(3, 184) = 3.70, p = 0.01; FItem(3, 156) = 10.71, p = 0.00], moral acceptability of the behavior [FSubject(3, 184) = 58.22, p = 0.00; FItem(3, 156) = 110.69, p = 0.00], emotional valence [FSubject(3, 184) = 3.41, p = 0.02; FItem(3, 156) = 3.11, p = 0.03], and emotional arousal [FSubject(3, 184) = 1.32, p = 0.27; FItem(3, 156) = 5.09, p = 0.00]. The experimental materials developed were not affected by the type of sport.Conclusions: The developed experimental materials can be used as experimental materials for cognitive neuroscience research on moral judgment in sport.
Highlights
Moral judgment in sport refers to the thought process that occurs when an athlete uses existing moral norms or standards to perceive moral phenomena in sport
The moral misconduct observed in Chinese athletes can be divided into the following four categories: violent behavior, doping, match-fixing or tanking, and self-reported dishonesty
The experimental materials developed were not affected by the type of sport
Summary
Moral judgment in sport refers to the thought process that occurs when an athlete uses existing moral norms or standards to perceive moral phenomena in sport. The scales used to measure moral judgment in sport can be divided into those which assess the stages of development of moral judgment (Bredemeier and Shields, 1984, 1986; Lind, 2006; Proios and Doganis, 2006; Mouratidou et al, 2007, 2008), those which assess value judgment in the sporting context (Hahm, 1989; Calmeiro et al, 2015), those which measure moral behavior judgment in sport (Gibbons et al, 1995; Stephens et al, 1997; Guivernau and Duda, 2002; Kavussanu et al, 2002; Sage et al, 2006; Lee et al, 2007; Romand et al, 2009; Malete et al, 2013; Whitehead et al, 2013; Gurpinar, 2014), and those which assess moral content judgment in sport (Proios, 2010) These scales have made important contributions to the study on moral judgment in sport. The development of experimental materials with moral dilemmas applicable to a wider range of sports is of great importance to further studies on moral judgment in athletes
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