<p>This study investigates how actor status, moral foundations theory and Schwartz values influence the moral judgments of guilt and punishment. I argue that to understand individual values consequences for actions, they must be considered within organizational values and larger institutional logics frameworks. Building off Zerubavel’s conception of a three level cognition (Zerubavel 1999), I argue for a tri level conception of values and morality in order to more fully understand how moral judgements work as well as the social context in which they are shaped. Using original research, I offer evidence of three levels of morality. First, I evaluate actor status on judgments of guilt and punishment. I then evaluate individual moral culture using Schwartz Values (Schwartz 2012; Vaisey and Miles 2014). I evaluate the impact of the organization on moral culture measure through the use of status hierarchies (Sauder, Lynn, and Podolny 2012). Finally, I evaluate broader cultural morality using Moral Foundations Theory (Graham et al. 2016; Kesebir and Haidt 2010). Taken together, these three levels of morality present a more ecologically valid understanding of the ways in which moral culture works from the individual, through the meso-social level and to the broader culture. I demonstrate the complex ways in which moral judgments are influenced by universal concerns, organizational influences and individual characteristics. I find that moral foundations theory conceptions of harm does not predict judgments of guilt and punishment but that Schwartz Values do influence these moral judgments. I also find that it is the actor status that most strongly predicts the outcomes of guilt and punishment. The research provides a foundation for future research of how actor status influences moral judgments of guilt and punishment beyond the limited moral community of the current study.</p> / Dissertation

Cette recherche visait à mieux comprendre les liens la morale personnelle, l’identité sociale au Canada et les médias. Pour ce faire, une analyse quantitative s’appuyant sur trois échantillons de données a été effectuée, et ce, à la lumière de la théorie des fondements moraux (TFM) (Haidt & Joseph, 2008) et de la théorie de l’identité sociale (Tajfel, 1981). Les échantillons sont les suivants : a) les mots clés assignés aux plaintes déposées au Conseil canadien des normes de la radiotélévision (CCNR); b) l’expression des fondements moraux des textes des plaintes délibérées par le CCNR et c) les données des participants canadiens de YourMorals.org, une recherche toujours en cours de Ditto, Graham, Haidt et coll. Les analyses de données ont permis de déterminer si le contenu médiatique stimule l’expression de matrices morales particulières, en fonction de la région d’origine, du genre et de la langue des plaignants. Les résultats suggèrent qu’il existerait des distinctions morales selon le genre, la langue, les régions d'origine des participants et les stimuli vécus. La présente étude est la première à mettre à l’épreuve la théorie des fondements moraux quant au jugement moral face à un contenu médiatique. Ce faisant, elle jette un éclairage nouveau sur cette même théorie en l’appliquant au contexte canadien et éclairant les liens entre la moralité et les identités canadiennes.

Thesis advisor: Liane Young / Thesis advisor: James Dungan / Moral psychologists disagree over whether descriptively different moral violations represent distinct cognitive domains or are in fact unified by common cognitive mechanisms. The Moral Foundations Theory (MFT; Haidt, 2007) offers five different domains of moral transgressions: Harm/Care, Fairness/Reciprocity, Ingroup/Loyalty, Authority/Respect, and Purity/Sanctity. Both intentionality and omission bias (e.g. omissions such as letting someone die being judged less harshly than actions such as killing someone) have been shown to impact moral judgments; however, it remains unclear how these rules modulate judgments across moral transgressions of various types. Here, we investigate the role of intentionality and omission bias across different moral violations to determine if the divide between moral domains represent true cognitive, (as opposed to descriptive), differences. We utilized a 2 x 2 x 5 design to create stories across the 5 domains posited by MFT that were intentional/accidental cases of actions/omissions. Importantly, this study also looks at four distinct moral judgments of wrongness, responsibility, blameworthiness, and punishment to assess the role of these rules across judgments. We found that intent and action play different roles across judgments, particularly when comparing wrongness and punishment. Intent seems to matter more for wrongness, whereas action matters more for punishment. Further, these rules also differ across domains. We found that intent matters more for the individualizing foundations of harm and fairness (versus the binding foundations of ingroup, authority, and purity) in judgments of wrongness and punishment. The difference between action and omission is also more important for the individualizing foundations for punishment. These data suggest intentionality and omission bias manifest themselves uniquely across moral judgments and domains and provide evidence that there are meaningful differences between domains. / Thesis (BS) — Boston College, 2014. / Submitted to: Boston College. College of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: College Honors Program. / Discipline: Psychology Honors Program. / Discipline: Psychology .

Misogyny, a hatred against women, is an attitude that causes emotional distress and can negatively affect women's psychological and physical health. It has shown itself in extreme ways and can be crippling to women. Studies have shown that psychological distress is heightened when women are subjected to sexist events. Misogyny exists in the classroom, workplace, and politics, and is virtually inescapable from women. It is not uncommon for women in positions of power are often unjustly branded with cruel epithets. Despite the modernity of today's culture, misogyny is still a prevalent issue. This study seeks to assess the underlying predictors that are related to misogyny. In order to identify these predictors, factors such as Big Five personality traits, spirituality, and moral reasoning will be examined. Factors such as demographics were also considered. Participants consisted of university students within a general psychology course who completed an online questionnaire for course credit. The study title was deceptive in order to obtain more accurate results. Results indicate that there is a relationship between misogyny and the predicted variables.

There is an ongoing debate among psychologists regarding the psychological factors underlying moral judgments. Rationalists argue that informational assumptions (i.e. ideological beliefs about how the world works) play a causal role in shaping moral judgments whereas intuitionists argue that informational assumptions are post hoc justifications for judgments made automatically by innate intuitions. In order to compare these two perspectives, the author conducted two studies in which informational assumptions related to ingroups and outgroups varied across conditions. In Study 1, political conservatives and liberals completed the moral relevance questionnaire while imagining they were in the US, Iran, or no specific country. Keeping in line with the predictions of the intuitionist perspective, the results showed that the judgments of conservatives and liberals did not significantly differ across conditions. Study 2 used a more in depth manipulation in which participants read a vignette about a government (US, Iran, or the fictional country of Kasbara) violating the rights of a minority group. As in Study 1, the results support the intuitionist perspective--the judgments of conservatives and liberals did not significantly differ across conditions. These findings play a small part in clarifying the role of informational assumptions in moral judgments.

Despite the existence of multiple scales designed to measure authoritarianism as a personality trait, current research disagrees as to whether current measures reliably measure all three dimensions of authoritarianism: submission, aggression, and traditionalism. This study focused on the development of a new scale in response to methodological and validity concerns of previously-used measures. This new scale was found to be a reliable measure of authoritarian belief in two subsequent studies of college-aged adults. Factor analysis of responses to the items of the new measure also provided evidence of the multidimensionality of authoritarianism as a construct. Further, significant correlations were found between the Graham and Haidt’s Moral Foundations model and the dimensions of authoritarianism as measured by this scale. Analysis also revealed a significant relationship between authoritarianism and measures of social hierarchical belief, as well as salient political variables. These findings reaffirm current theoretical belief in the tridimensional model of authoritarianism and provide a new, reliable measure of the authoritarian personality. This has implications for the creation of a more productive dialogue between politically-divided groups, though further research is needed on the exact nature of authoritarianism itself.

This dissertation explores strategies for addressing identity-related barriers to environmental problem-solving through the lens of two social-psychological theories: self-affirmation theory and moral foundations theory. Through one theoretical review, two online experiments and one in-lab experiment I explore, integrate and test theoretically grounded strategies for reducing the defensive information processing that can exacerbate intergroup divisions in multi-stakeholder settings. The specific objectives of this dissertation are to 1) integrate self-affirmation theory and moral foundations theory into the current knowledge about collaborative conservation (Chapter 2), 2) evaluate ways of tailoring environmental communication to better reach socially and politically diverse audiences (Chapter 3), and 3) experimentally test the effectiveness of an approach, based on self-affirmation theory, to facilitate productive discussion of complex, value-laden issues in group settings. Before presenting the results of this work, I provide a broad overview of the problem of group-based divisions in environmental conflict and the theoretical underpinnings of the dissertation (Chapter 1). Finally, I summarize the results and discuss the broader implications of the research (Chapter 5). The results of this research offer initial insights into how tools grounded in these theories can most effectively be applied to help alleviate identity-based barriers to environmental problem-solving. / Doctor of Philosophy / This dissertation explores strategies for addressing identity-related barriers to environmental problem-solving through the lens of two social-psychological theories: self-affirmation theory and moral foundations theory. Through one theoretical review, two online experiments and one in-lab experiment I explore, integrate and test theoretically grounded strategies for reducing the defensive information processing that can exacerbate intergroup divisions in multi-stakeholder settings. The specific objectives of this dissertation are to 1) integrate self-affirmation theory and moral foundations theory into the current knowledge about collaborative conservation (Chapter 2), 2) evaluate ways of tailoring environmental communication to better reach socially and politically diverse audiences (Chapter 3), and 3) experimentally test the effectiveness of an approach, based on self-affirmation theory, to facilitate productive discussion of complex, value-laden issues in group settings. Before presenting the results of this work, I provide a broad overview of the problem of group-based divisions in environmental conflict and the theoretical underpinnings of the dissertation (Chapter 1). Finally, I summarize the results and discuss the broader implications of the research (Chapter 5). The results of this research offer initial insights into how tools grounded in these theories can most effectively be applied to help alleviate identity-based barriers to environmental problem-solving.

The urgent need to shift from fossil fuels to renewable energy in combating climate change is often impeded by conflicts and political polarization. Multistakeholder collaboration, which involves diverse participants working together to address complex issues, is a potential solution, but entrenched viewpoints can hinder progress. To address this challenge, we conducted an experiment testing two socio-psychological interventions—grounded in self-affirmation theory and moral foundations theory— designed to foster constructive group dynamics in multi-stakeholder settings. We recruited 1,244 students from Southern Illinois University, Carbondale to participate in an online survey about their opinions on several hypothetical on-campus sustainability initiatives. An initiative that would require students to complete a course in sustainability was found to be the most polarizing. We then invited a second sample of 282 students to discuss their views on this initiative in small groups. Prior to the discussion, each group was randomly assigned to complete one of two intervention exercises that involved a short writing task, or to a control condition. We found that groups assigned to the self-affirmation intervention exhibited significantly more openness-perspective-taking, information processing and agreement, compared to those in the control groups. Participants in groups who completed the moral foundations intervention were more supportive of the initiative overall, but showed no increase in support, openness-perspective-taking, information processing or agreement, compared to other groups. These findings provide preliminary evidence that completing a short self-affirmation intervention prior to engaging discussion has the potential to facilitate constructive dialogs on divisive issues related to sustainability.

The focus of this study was the organizational working environment and existing partisanship evident in the United States Congress. There has been a reduction in the number of laws passed over the last 30 years from a high of over 1,000 to a low of around 120, with a period of complete government shutdown in 2013. This qualitative research utilized qualitative content analysis to discover the nature of partisan conflict as demonstrated by 6 members of Congress. The conceptual framework for this study was moral foundations theory. Different moral principles held by Democrats and Republicans were studied as a possible explanation for the inability of one end of the political spectrum to identify with, work with, and comprehend the belief systems of the other. Archival video data for each participant was viewed on C-Span and related transcripts were analyzed using qualitative content analysis. Emerging themes were then inductively coded in order to understand the nature of the partisan conflict in Congress. Results demonstrate that Republicans and Democrats rely on different sets of moral foundations and that there is limited crossover between those who occupy the extreme ends of the ideological continuum. This lack of crossover essentially leads members with differing ideology and moral foundations to not comprehend the moral message of their opponents. With this knowledge, political strategists can help to develop communication and political approaches that take into consideration the moral foundations of ideological opponents. Social change implications include improved understanding of the ideological stance of members of the opposing party and improved working relationships in Congress, resulting in an organizational working environment that is less conflicted.

The thesis deals with the theme of morality and racist attitudes towards Roms. The theoretical part is focused on describing the development of studying the phenomenon of morality, especially on intuitionistic theory (eg.:. J. Haidt). Next on moral emotions, namely disgust, and their influence on individual judgment in a social situation. And on attitudes to other racial groups. The intention is to refer to theories that assume influence of emotions on moral judgment, as well as the activation of attitudes. In the practical part was examined moral dilemma situations rating among 142 respondents, while their disposition to the perception of disgust and their racist attitudes. By the research was proved that people evaluate the situation as more immoral if there is participant with different ethnicity, depending on their perception of disgust. Direct relationship between evaluation and racist attitudes was not proven. The conclusions are in detail discussed in the thesis.