Dark Side Of Morality Research Articles

Susan Wolf on Supererogation and the Dark Side of Morality

Susan Wolf on Supererogation and the Dark Side of Morality

The Dark Side of Morality – Neural Mechanisms Underpinning Moral Convictions and Support for Violence

People are motivated by shared social values that, when held with moral conviction, can serve as compelling mandates capable of facilitating support for ideological violence. The current study examined this dark side of morality by identifying specific cognitive and neural mechanisms associated with beliefs about the appropriateness of sociopolitical violence, and determining the extent to which the engagement of these mechanisms was predicted by moral convictions. Participants reported their moral convictions about a variety of sociopolitical issues prior to undergoing functional MRI scanning. During scanning, they were asked to evaluate the appropriateness of violent protests that were ostensibly congruent or incongruent with their views about sociopolitical issues. Complementary univariate and multivariate analytical strategies comparing neural responses to congruent and incongruent violence identified neural mechanisms implicated in processing salience and in the encoding of subjective value. As predicted, neuro-hemodynamic response was modulated parametrically by individuals’ beliefs about the appropriateness of congruent relative to incongruent sociopolitical violence in ventromedial prefrontal cortex, and by moral conviction in ventral striatum. Overall moral conviction was predicted by neural response to congruent relative to incongruent violence in amygdala. Together, these findings indicate that moral conviction about sociopolitical issues serves to increase their subjective value, overriding natural aversion to interpersonal harm.

The Dark Side of Morality: Group Polarization and Moral Epistemology

This article argues that philosophers and laypeople commonly conceptualize moral truths or justified moral beliefs as discoverable through intuition, argument, or some other purely cognitive or affective process. It then contends that three empirically well‐supported theories all predict that this “Discovery Model” of morality plays a substantial role in causing social polarization. The same three theories are then used to argue that an alternative “Negotiation Model” of morality—according to which moral truths are not discovered but instead created by actively negotiating compromises—promises to reduce polarization by fostering a progressive willingness to “work across the aisle” to settle moral issues cooperatively. This article then examines potential methods for normatively evaluating polarization, arguing there are prima facie reasons to favor the Negotiation Model over the Discovery Model based on their hypothesized effects on polarization. Finally, I outline avenues for further empirical and philosophical research.

The dark side of morality: Prioritizing sanctity over care motivates denial of mind and prejudice toward sexual outgroups.

Moral values bind communities together and foster cooperation, yet these same values can lead to the derogation and marginalization of outgroups. Five studies tested a theoretical framework proposing that preferentially endorsing moral values of sanctity versus care (the sanctity-care trade-off) produces a motivational bias whereby people perceive sexual outgroup members as less human. This denial of mind, in turn, legitimizes expressions of prejudice and discrimination toward sexual outgroups. Study 1 showed that natural variations in people's moral values predicted denial of mind and prejudice. Study 2 replicated this pattern, examining political liberals and conservatives, and demonstrating that moral values and denial of mind help explain the relationship between personal politics and prejudice. Study 3 measured people's moral values by examining people's willingness to trade-off a moral value for money and used this measure to predict denial of mind, prejudice, and decreased willingness to help transgender individuals. Study 4 used religion to boost sanctity values and found a corresponding increase in denial of mind and prejudice. Finally, Study 5 reduced denial of mind and prejudice by intensifying concerns about care. Together, these studies demonstrate that moral values importantly influence how people decide who possesses a mind and is entitled to moral rights and who is mindless and allowed to be hurt or neglected. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).

The Dark Side of Morality: Group Polarization and Moral Epistemology

This article argues that philosophers and laypeople commonly conceptualize moral truths or justified moral beliefs as discoverable through intuition, argument, or some other purely cognitive or affective process. It then contends that three empirically well-supported theories all predict that this ‘Discovery Model’ of morality plays a substantial role in causing social polarization. The same three theories are then used to argue that an alternative ‘Negotiation Model’ of morality — according to which moral truths are not discovered but instead created by actively negotiating compromises — promises to reduce polarization by fostering a progressive willingness to ‘work across the aisle’ to settle moral issues cooperatively. This article then examines potential methods for normatively evaluating polarization, arguing there are prima facie reasons to favor the Negotiation Model over the Discovery Model based on their hypothesized effects on polarization. Finally, I outline avenues for further empirical and philosophical research.

Supplemental Material for The Dark Side of Morality: Prioritizing Sanctity Over Care Motivates Denial of Mind and Prejudice Toward Sexual Outgroups

Supplemental Material for The Dark Side of Morality: Prioritizing Sanctity Over Care Motivates Denial of Mind and Prejudice Toward Sexual Outgroups