The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in unprecedented exposure to Potentially Morally Injurious Events (PMIEs) for nurses, in which they were both moral transgressors and moral victims, with deleterious consequences on their psycho-social health and functioning. Our experimental design compared memories of PMIEs with memories of severe moral transgressions (SMTs), in which participants were only moral transgressors. Drawing from Self-Determination Theory and research on moral auto-biographical episodic memories, we assessed a conceptual model describing the impact of recalling a single PMIE or SMT event on nurses’ burnout, work satisfaction and adaptive performance. Our convenience sample comprised 614 Romanian nurses, and data was analyzed with path analysis, general linear modelling, and t-tests. Findings showed that memories of PMIEs, compared to SMTs, were more autonomy thwarting, being associated with more controlled work motivation, less moral learning, higher burnout, less work satisfaction, and adaptive performance. Burnout, moral learning, and work satisfaction were significant mediators of the relationships between PMIE and SMT recall and, respectively, adaptive performance. Our results highlight the urgency for organizational practices of moral repair for nurses after the pandemic, along with interventions meant to increase their autonomy and self-determined work motivation.

Nurses have been frequently exposed to Potentially Morally Injurious Events (PMIEs) during the COVID-19 pandemic. Due to resource scarcity, they both perpetrated (self-PMIEs) and passively witnessed (other-PMIEs) moral transgressions toward the patients, severely violating their moral values. Our study investigated the impact of self- and other-PMIEs on work outcomes by exploring nurses’ episodic memories of these events and the basic psychological need thwarting associated with them. Using a quasi-experimental design, on a convenience sample of 463 Romanian nurses, we found that PMIEs memories were uniquely associated with burnout and turnover intentions, after controlling for socio-demographic characteristics, general basic psychological need satisfaction at work and other phenomenological characteristics. Both self- and other-PMIEs memories were need thwarting, with autonomy and competence mediating their differential impact on burnout, and with relatedness—on turnover intentions. Our findings emphasize the need for organizational moral repair practices, which should include enhancing nurses’ feelings of autonomy, relatedness and competence. Psychological counseling and psychotherapy should be provided to nurses to prevent their episodic memories of PMIEs to be (fully) integrated in autobiographical knowledge, because this integration could have severe consequences on their psycho-social function and occupational health, as well as on the organizational climate in healthcare institutions.

The COVID-19 pandemic was a fertile ground for nurses’ exposure to self- and other-Potentially Morally Injurious Events (PMIEs). Our study explored the effects of nurses’ memories of self- and other-PMIEs on occupational wellbeing and turnover intentions. Using an experimental design on a convenience sample of 634 Romanian nurses, we tested a conceptual model with PLS-SEM, finding adequate explanatory and predictive power. Memories of self- and other-PMIEs were uniquely associated with work engagement, burnout, and turnover intentions, compared to a control group. These relationships were mediated by the three basic psychological needs. Relatedness was more thwarted for memories of other-PMIEs, while competence and autonomy were more thwarted for memories of self-PMIEs. Perceived supervisor support weakened the indirect effect between type of PMIE and turnover intentions, through autonomy satisfaction, but not through burnout. Self-disclosure weakened the indirect effect between type of PMIE and turnover intentions, through autonomy satisfaction, and both burnout and work engagement. Our findings emphasize the need for different strategies in addressing the negative long-term effects of nurses’ exposure to self- and other-PMIEs, according to the basic psychological need satisfaction and type of wellbeing indicator.

Using e-cigarettes for smoking cessation is a controversial topic among health experts. Evidence suggests that vaping might have been moralized among the general public. Despite the detrimental consequences of moralizing health behaviors on social cohesion and health, some argue for using moralization strategically to prevent and combat vaping. We aim to add to the body of literature showing the dangers of moralization in health by proposing a person-centered approach to the moralization of anti-vaping attitudes. Our cross-sectional survey explores the moralization of anti-vaping attitudes and its predictors on a convenience sample of 348 Romanian never-vapers, before the final vote to severely restrict vaping. By fitting a hierarchical regression model on our data, we found support for a unique contribution of negative prototypes (β = 0.13) and opinions of vapers (β = 0.08) in predicting moralization, with significant contributions of piggybacking on moralized self-control, on moralized attitudes toward smoking and on sanctity/degradation, disgust, anger, harm to children, and gender. Together, these variables explained 56% of the variance of the moralization of anti-vaping attitudes. Our findings add to our knowledge of motivated moralization and advise against using moralization in health, suggesting that people may weaponize it to legitimize group dislike.

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