Question framing and sensitivity to consequences in sacrificial moral dilemmas

Area of Science:

• Moral Psychology
• Cognitive Science
• Decision-Making

Background:

• Sacrificial dilemmas involve judging the ethics of sacrificing one life to save multiple others.
• Previous research has explored factors influencing moral judgments in such scenarios.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate how question framing affects moral judgments in sacrificial dilemmas.
• To determine if framing influences attention towards beneficiaries or targets.

Main Methods:

• Participants evaluated five sacrificial dilemmas.
• Judgments of "morally right" and "morally wrong" were collected separately.
• Dilemmas varied beneficiaries (strangers, cousins, children) and targets (firefighter, bank robber).

Main Results:

• Ratings of "morally right" varied more across different beneficiaries than targets.
• Ratings of "morally wrong" varied more across different targets than beneficiaries.
• Question framing selectively heightened attention to corresponding variables.

Conclusions:

• The way a moral question is phrased can bias judgments by directing attention.
• "Morally right" framing emphasizes beneficiaries, while "morally wrong" framing emphasizes targets.
• This highlights the role of selective attention in shaping moral appraisals.