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Emotion and deliberative reasoning in moral judgment.

Denise Dellarosa Cummins¹, Robert C Cummins

¹Department of Psychology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Champaign, IL, USA.

Frontiers in Psychology

|September 14, 2012

Summary

Moral judgments involve fast, emotional, and slow, deliberative processes. This study found that deontological violations, contrary to predictions, did not slow decision-making and positive affect increased moral judgments.

Keywords:

dual process emotion moral decision-making moral judgment

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Area of Science:

Cognitive Psychology
Moral Psychology
Neuroscience

Background:

Influential dual-process models posit moral judgment arises from rapid, affect-laden, and slower, deliberative processes.
Conflicts between these processes are thought to increase decision time for resolution.
Deontological principles, prohibiting intentional harm, are presumed to evoke negative affect, biasing early judgments.

Purpose of the Study:

To test a dual-process model of moral judgment using decision time and consensus as conflict measures.
To investigate the role of deontological violations in moral decision-making speed and conflict.
To examine the influence of affect on early moral judgments.

Main Methods:

Three experiments were conducted, classifying moral dilemmas by decision time, consensus, and deontological criteria.
Experiment 1 manipulated decision time (unlimited vs. reduced) for moral dilemmas.
Experiment 2 assessed decision consistency under time constraints and no constraints.
Experiment 3 manipulated affect by having participants rate visual stimuli before making moral judgments.

Main Results:

Reducing decision time decreased utilitarian judgments, but dilemmas with more deontological violations had faster decision times.
Deontological violations did not predict decisional conflict profiles.
Positive affect induction increased deontological decisions, contrary to predictions that negative affect or cognitive tasks would mitigate this.

Conclusions:

Early moral judgments are influenced by affect, supporting a role for emotion in rapid decision-making.
The findings contradict the model's predictions regarding deontological violations predicting early judgment differences.
Engaging in tasks inconsistent with negative emotional responses does not diminish their impact on moral judgments.