The affective harm account (AHA) of moral judgment: Reconciling cognition and affect, dyadic morality and disgust, harm and purity.

Abstract

Moral psychology has long debated whether moral judgment is rooted in harm versus affect. We reconcile this debate with the affective harm account (AHA) of moral judgment. The AHA understands harm as an intuitive perception (i.e., perceived harm), and divides "affect" into two: embodied visceral arousal (i.e., gut feelings) and stimulus-directed affective appraisals (e.g., ratings of disgustingness). The AHA was tested in a randomized, double-blind pharmacological experiment with healthy young adults judging the immorality, harmfulness, and disgustingness of everyday moral scenarios (e.g., lying) and unusual purity scenarios (e.g., sex with a corpse) after receiving either a placebo or the β-blocker propranolol (a drug that dampens visceral arousal). Results confirmed the three key hypotheses of the AHA. First, perceived harm and affective appraisals are neither competing nor independent but intertwined. Second, although both perceived harm and affective appraisals predict moral judgment, perceived harm is consistently relevant across all scenarios (in line with the theory of dyadic morality), whereas affective appraisals are especially relevant in unusual purity scenarios (in line with affect-as-information theory). Third, the "gut feelings" of visceral arousal are not as important to morality as often believed. Dampening visceral arousal (via propranolol) did not directly impact moral judgment, but instead changed the relative contribution of affective appraisals to moral judgment-and only in unusual purity scenarios. By embracing a constructionist view of the mind that blurs traditional dichotomies, the AHA reconciles historic harm-centric and current affect-centric theories, parsimoniously explaining judgment differences across various moral scenarios without requiring any "moral foundations."

The Problem of Purity in Moral Psychology

“…Although participants intuitively perceive harm in purity violations, we do acknowledge that these violations are less obviously harmful (and more affectively evocative) than interpersonal harm (Gray et al, 2022). Immoral acts involving interpersonal harm may be the most universal, common, and consequential (Hofmann et al, 2014), but it is important for moral psychology to understand how people react to all moral acts, not just the most common and consequential of them-as work on purity demonstrates.…”

“…Of course, one could argue about whether we should be prioritizing the judgments of participants (who see impurity as harmful) versus researchers (who see impurity as harmless), but moral psychology-with its roots in anthropology-has long emphasized privileging the intuitions of participants (Haidt et al, 2000). Although participants intuitively perceive harm in purity violations, we do acknowledge that these violations are less obviously harmful (and more affectively evocative) than interpersonal harm (Gray et al, 2022). Immoral acts involving interpersonal harm may be the most universal, common, and consequential (Hofmann et al, 2014), but it is important for moral psychology to understand how people react to all moral acts, not just the most common and consequential of them-as work on purity demonstrates.…”

“…That many moral psychological theories and paradigms (e.g., work on moral dilemmas) consider the role of emotion and intuition in moral judgment (e.g., Greene, 2009;Greene et al, 2001) can be attributed in part to work on purity. Even a recent extension of the Theory of Dyadic Morality-PURITY 15 the Affective Harm Account (Gray et al, 2022)-explicitly acknowledge the role of affect in moral judgment, especially for the ambiguously-harmful and often-bizarre scenarios used to represent impurity.…”

Pain sensitivity predicts support for moral and political views across the aisle.

“…It is known that perception of suffering, damage, or harm-be it physical or nonphysical-caused by an intentional agent on a vulnerable patient can intensify judgments across moral domains (cf. dyadic morality theory; Gray et al, 2012Gray et al, , 2022Schein & Gray, 2018). Considering that higher sensitivity to physical pain may heighten the perception of harm and that perception of harm can intensify moral views, it follows that more pain-sensitive individuals may have stronger moral views (e.g., stronger reactions to unfairness; Wang et al, 2019).…”

Political Censorship Feels Acceptable When Ideas Seem Harmful and False

“…Harm is often understood as something objectivethe obvious presence of physical injury or emotional suffering which, in turn, justifies censorship. However, emerging research suggests that harm is more a matter of perception (Gray et al, 2022), with different people seeing different acts as more or less harmful depending on their cultural assumptions (Schein & Gray, 2018). These varied assumptions about harm drive political conflict.…”