The relationships between Stress, Dark Triad personality and utilitarian Moral Judgment

Abstract

There is a growing evidence that stress affects cognitive and emotional processes underling decision making. However, according some authors, subclinical personality traits of the participants must be also considered in this relation between stress and moral decision. Our study examines whether stress affects moral decision-making according two different subclinical personalities. Forty undergraduate volunteers were previously distributed according their personality traits (Machiavellian; Narcissism and Normal) and randomly assigned to both conditions (stress vs. control). The stress induction was assessed with a self-reported questionnaire and with a measurement of heart rate. All participants performed a moral decision-making task in which every day moral dilemmas were described. The main results suggest that stress group made less utilitarian choices when compared to control group. Although machiavellian and narcissistic participants made more utilitarian decisions; the interaction between stress, personality and moral judgment did not reach significance. We conclude that stress induction predisposed participants to less utilitarian responses when faced to personal and impersonal moral dilemmas. We also suggested that subclinical personality (particularly narcissism) seems to be less permeable to stress; revealing the same moral utilitarian pattern in both experimental conditions.