Findings on the Revised Morally Debatable Behaviors Scale

Investment in Long-Term Goals and Commitment to Just Means Drive the Need to Believe in a Just World

“…Each item is rated on a 10-point scale rang ing from 1 (never jus ti fied) to 10 (always jus ti fied). Reli abil ity for the pres ent sam ple was accept able, Cronbach's alpha = .80 (see Katz et al, 1994, for more reli abil ity and valid ity infor ma tion). Table 2 shows cor re la tions among all mea sures in this study.…”

“…Cronbach's alpha for the pres ent sam ple was 73 (for infor ma tion on the reli abil ity and valid ity of this scale, see Chris tie & Geiss, 1970). Finally, par tic i pants com pleted the hon esty-dis hon esty moral ity subscale of the revised Morally Debat able Behav iors Scales (MDBS-R) (Katz, Santman, & Lonero, 1994). This subscale mea sures the extent to which respon dents feel that par tic u lar dis hon est behav iors (e.g., cheat ing on an exam, lying in one's own inter est) are jus ti fi able.…”

Prosocial Behavior and Religion: New Evidence Based on Projective Measures and Peer Ratings

“…An important distinction between such an empathetic versus principled motivation of prosociality exists both in philosophical and psychological literature on the subject (Batson et al 2002;Dovidio and Penner 2002). Some previous evidence suggests an association between religiousness and at least selfreported empathy (see Batson, Schoenrade, and Ventis 1993, for a review;Luyten, Corveleyn, and Fontaine 1998;Schieman and Van Gundy 2000) and moral integrity-honesty (Spilka et al 2003;see also Jones 1997;Katz, Santman, and Lonero 1994). Second, as women are known to be higher in both religiosity (Beit-Hallahmi and Argyle 1997) and, to some extent (see Eisenberg and Fabes 1998, for a discussion), agreeableness-related constructs (Costa, Terracciano, and McCrae 2001), gender may be responsible for the religiousness-prosociality association.…”

The Why and How of Defending Belief in a Just World

“…The measures of antisocial tendencies were as follows: the Self-Report Delinquency Scale (Rushton & Chrisjohn, 1981; sample item, "I have stolen something out of a little shop"), the honesty-dishonesty morality subscale of the revised Morally Debatable Behaviors Scale (Katz, Santman, & Lonero, 1994; sample item, "Someone accepting a bribe in the course of their duties," rated on justifiability), and the Mach IV measure of Machiavellianism (Christie & Geis, 1970; sample item, "Honesty is the best policy in all cases" [reverse-coded]). The stronger participants' BJW, the lower they scored on these scales (Self-Report Delinquency Scale, r ¼ À0.21; honesty-dishonesty morality subscale , r ¼ À0.24; Machiavellianism, r ¼ À.038).…”