Wrongness in different relationships: Relational context effects on moral judgment

Abstract

Morality primarily serves socio-relational functions. However, little research in moral psychology investigates how relational factors impact moral judgment, and a theoretically grounded approach to investigating relational context effects on moral judgment is lacking.We used Relationship Regulation Theory (Rai & Fiske, 2011) and Moral Foundations Theory (Graham et al., 2011) to explore how varying the relationship between actors and victims impacts judgment of different types of moral violations. Across three studies, using a diverse range of moral violations and varying the experimental design, relational context substantially influenced third-party judgment of moral violations, and typically explained variability in moral judgment independent of several factors that have consistently been shown to strongly correlate with moral judgment (e.g., political ideology; moral value endorsements). Results lend novel but mixed support to Relationship Regulation Theory, and provide some novel implications for Moral Foundations Theory. These studies highlight the importance of relational factors in developing a comprehensive understanding of moral psychology, and provide guidelines for exploring how relational factors might shape moral judgment.Keywords: moral foundations; moral judgment; moral motives; relational context; relationship regulation theory The notion that the relational context of a moral act (e.g., who is doing the action and to whom) should influence how wrong we judge that act is hardly surprising. Indeed, it is easy to think of actions that one may find permissible when done by one person but objectionable when done by someone else: for example, my sibling can take my belongings without asking, but my officemate must ask first; also, one might feel worse after ridiculing another person's weight gain if that person is a spouse rather than a casual acquaintance. It would seem, therefore, that relational context is inherently important in understanding variability in moral judgment. Indeed, several major scholars have stressed this point (e.g., Bloom, 2011;Fiske, 1991;Greenwood, 2011;Rai & Fiske, 2011). Yet oddly enough, relational context is given scant attention in the field of moral psychology (and also in moral philosophy; e.g., Kant, 1785Kant, /1989). This is a problem which Bloom (2011) refers to as "the crisis in moral psychology". Bloom notes that although most real-world moral judgments are about actions occurring in specific relational contexts (e.g., between mother and child), most research in the field focuses "on how people judge…the interactions of unrelated strangers…lead [ing] us to ask the wrong questions, design the wrong studies, and develop the wrong theories." (p.27). One novel theory that places relational factors at the forefront of moral psychology isRelationship Regulation Theory (RRT; Rai & Fiske, 2011). RRT stresses that judgments of right and wrong are inherently embedded into four cognitively distinct frameworks that guide human social interaction (i.e., the four rel...

The Influence of War on Moral Judgments about Harm

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Moral decision-making among young muslim adults on harmless taboo violations: The effects of gender, religiosity, and political affiliation

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