Reactive attitudes are distinctively moral emotions that occur when a moral harm has occurred. Recent studies in moral psychology suggest that our reactive attitudes may be influenced by factors extraneous to moral evaluation, such as hunger, sleep deprivation, and negative moods. I argue that these influences lead us to sanction unfairly. Even though reactive attitudes may be a natural response to perceived moral wrongdoing, we cannot justifiably inflict undeserved harm. However, if we can learn to recognize and eliminate the effects of these irrelevant influences, then we can use our reactive attitudes productively in holding others morally accountable.

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Within the psychology of religion, research suggests that religious engagement influences self-regulation, i.e., a person’s ability to pursue goals. Theoretical explanations for this relationship tend to oversimplify both sides of the connection, construing religious engagement narrowly in terms of beliefs and interpreting self-regulation as a matter of self-interested restraint. These conceptual specifications are challenged by perspectives within religious studies that are committed to analyzing religions as ordinary social phenomena and by evidence from psychological studies of normative behavior. This dissertation employs these insights to broaden the theoretical scope of the study of self-regulation through a series of interdisciplinary reviews and an empirical study. To test the relationship between self-regulation and religious engagement, the dissertation presents a cross-sectional study of an online sample of 412 participants. Each participant completed five previously established psychological surveys and experiments that index: how conventional they consider their religiosity; the degree to which they are embedded in obligatory relationships, roughly called “social density”; their endorsement of what Moral Foundations Theory calls “binding” moral intuitions; emotional regulatory capacity; and delayed discounting rates, a common proxy for impulsivity. A series of hierarchical linear regressions showed that conventional religiosity was associated with both emotional regulation and delayed discounting. Delayed discounting and emotional regulation, however, were not associated. Statistical mediation analyses showed that the relationship between conventional religiosity and emotional regulation was fully mediated by social density, but the connection between conventional religiosity and delayed discounting was not influenced by any of the other variables. Collectively these results support the primary argument of this dissertation – that the theoretical focus within psychological research on religious engagement and self-regulation has become unduly narrow in its construal of both concepts. This dissertation concludes by reflecting on these results in light of what we know about formalized inquiries of this kind from the philosophy of science.

This dissertation examines theological liberalism and theological conservatism among U.S. Protestants through the lens of moral psychology research. I argue that this theological division parallels similar divides in politics and in morality, theology having become increasingly intertwined with both over the last century. I analyze perspectives on theological method, doctrines of God, and atonement theologies within texts selected for representativeness and influence. Chapter 1 reviews literature in two scholarly discussions: the historical thesis of a “Two-Party System” among U.S. Protestants since the early twentieth century and the sociological thesis of “culture wars” emerging in the late twentieth century. I synthesize chastened versions of both theses into an account of a process of theological polarization. Chapter 2 presents two frameworks from moral psychology, Cultural-Developmental Theory and Moral Foundations Theory, and explains how these frameworks are used in the following chapters. Chapter 3 analyzes theological method in the selected texts. I find that theological conservatives prioritize an Ethic of Divinity that includes authority and sanctity in their approaches to theological method, while theological liberals appeal largely to care and fairness-as-equality in the context of an Ethic of Autonomy and an Ethic of Community. Chapter 4 analyzes doctrines of God. I find that theological conservatives balance divine authority and sanctity with divine care within the context of an Ethic of Divinity, while theological liberals mostly emphasize care, fairness-as-equality, and liberty in conceptions of God within Ethics of Autonomy and of Community. Chapter 5 analyzes atonement theologies. I find that theological conservatives typically foreground authority, sanctity, care, and fairness-as-proportionality within Ethic of Divinity perspectives, while theological liberals mainly focus on care and fairness-as-equality within Ethics of Autonomy and of Community. Chapter 6 surfaces the sociopolitical relevance of these findings in several areas: stances toward abuse, authoritarianism, and divine otherness; connections of theological outlooks to forms of life and reproductive patterns; and possibilities for building understanding-based empathy using informed responses to theological polarization among U.S. Protestants. I point toward the potential for future work on the implicit moral psychologies of doctrines, transnational aspects of theological polarization, and ethical formation for democratic participation. / 2026-07-10T00:00:00Z

This dissertation focuses on the concept of authenticity and its implications for our projects of self-creation, particularly those involving the use of "enhancement technologies" (such as stimulant drugs, "mood brighteners", or brain stimulation). After an introduction to the concept of authenticity and the enhancement debate in the first part of the thesis, part 2 considers the main analyses of authenticity in the contemporary philosophical literature. It begins with those emphasizing self-creation, and shows that, despite their merits, such views cannot adequately deal with certain types of cases, which require a third option, “true self” accounts, emphasizing self-discovery. However, it is argued that in their existing versions, accounts of this third sort are also unsatisfactory. Part 3 of the thesis proposes a new account of the "true self" sort, intended to improve upon existing ones. Common problematic assumptions about the concept of the true self are critiqued, after which a new analysis of that concept is presented, based on seven different conditions. Two specific definitions of authenticity, respectively emphasizing self-expression and the preservation of one's true self, are provided, and its relation to various associated notions, such as integrity or sincerity, are examined. Finally, part 4 looks at the implications of the previous parts for the enhancement debate. In particular, it discusses the prospect of technologically enhancing our personality and mood dispositions. Do such interventions always threaten our authenticity, as some worry? A negative answer is provided to that question. Various potential pitfalls hinted at by the inauthenticity worry are discussed and acknowledged. It is, however, argued that such enhancements could still in principle be used in a fully authentic manner, and that they have the potential to bring about genuine improvements in our mood but also to our moral capacities and our affective rationality more generally.

This thesis looks at the failure of individual people living in affluent societies to do more to help those living in conditions of extreme poverty at the present moment. Affluent people have the capacity to assist, by contributing additional funds to aid and humanitarian organisations. Given an understanding of what is at stake, the fact that they fail to do so is both morally problematic and difficult to explain. Yet, without an understanding of the causes of inaction, it is difficult to know what measures may be taken to alleviate extreme suffering in the world today. The thesis draws upon different philosophical accounts of practical reason to argue that the conduct of the affluent can only be understood in one of three ways: these people may lack decisive reason to assist, they may be misinformed, or they may be rationally deficient in some regard. Considering each possibility in turn, it advances two central arguments. Firstly, the normative reasons claim is sound: affluent people, who do not incur minor costs by assisting, ought to do more. Secondly, these people tend to have false beliefs about the nature of poverty, to make substantive errors of judgement, and to follow flawed patterns of reasoning when they deliberate about what to do. Taken together, these factors explain their failure to act. Building upon this diagnosis, the thesis then considers how to respond to the problem of inaction, advancing a solution that is institutional in character. It argues for the construction of a division of labour between state and citizen, at the national level, which would see political institutions take on responsibility for poverty eradication, thereby leaving individuals freer to pursue their own personal goals and objectives. In order to perform this function effectively, wealthy nations would have to improve the quantity and quality of assistance that they provide to low-income countries. They would also have to cease partaking in practices that harm the global poor. This approach has a number of advantages over reliance on private philanthropy alone: it forms part of a fair and effective solution to the problem of motivating assistance, the arrangement it proposes is both stable and legitimate, and it is also something that could be achieved in practice. Therefore, it represents part of the best possible way in which to proceed.

The central argument of this dissertation is that virtue ethics is overly individualistic. In response, I develop and defend a more relational, ecological account - what I call extended virtues. First, following Andy Clark, Kim Sterelny, and others, I argue that cognition and emotion can be embedded in, scaffolded by, or even extended to include various environmental resources. These arguments undermine default internalism about cognitive and affective processes. Next, I show how recent work in social and personality psychology similarly undermines individualism about the bearers of these cognitive and affective processes. Taken together, these arguments have significant but heretofore underappreciated implications for virtue ethics. After reviewing the literature which attempts to spell out the ethical implications of embedded, scaffolded, and extended cognition, I conclude that a more substantive engagement with virtue ethics is needed. I then show how plausible, mainstream theories of virtue assume default internalism and individualism, and are thus subject to charges of empirical inadequacy. Finally, I formulate my account of extended virtues in response to these shortcomings. I begin by making three explicit arguments for why an account of extended virtues is needed. I then develop two further arguments - the process argument and the bearer argument - which yield the conclusion that the processes relevant to, and the bearers of, moral and intellectual virtues can be embedded, scaffolded, or extended. After providing examples and filling in details about the hypotheses of embedded, scaffolded, and extended virtue, I propose that virtues are less like dispositions and more like relations. I conclude by suggesting that ecological metaphors such as stewardship are more fitting than traditional views of morality as inner strength.

Este estudo qualitativo de caráter exploratório está pautado em preceitos convergentes da Educação e da Psicologia tendo por objetivo identificar referências pessoais que influenciem os valores ético-morais adotados pelo público adolescente. A investigação teórico empírica perpassou pressupostos da educação em valores consonantes a prerrogativas da psicologia moral visando elencar características admiráveis apontadas pelos jovens participantes; o presente trabalho foi emoldurado por variáveis do escopo educativo assumindo-o como um campo privilegiado de interação entre as distintas gerações que venham a favorecer uma construção reflexiva de valores ético-morais a partir de princípios louváveis. Em função destas prerrogativas uma questão central norteou nossa pesquisa: que influências perpassam a constituição de referências éticas e morais da atual geração de adolescentes? Alunos do terceiro ano do Ensino Médio da rede pública estadual paulista atendidos por um programa socioeducativo de formação complementar participaram desta pesquisa; estes dezenove adolescentes de dezessete anos por ocasião da pesquisa revelaram especificidades de seu raciocínio moral respondendo a um questionário de oito questões compostas. A organização e a composição dos resultados demonstrou a singularidade e a complexidade de sua leitura de mundo impregnada pelo contexto e pelo momento histórico vivenciado: moradores do entorno do grande ABC paulista composto pelos municípios de Santo André, São Bernardo do Campo e São Caetano região considerada referência do movimento sindical brasileiro por ocasião do início das mobilizações de rua convocadas pelas redes sociais em Junho de dois mil e treze. A sistematização dos dados foi organizada por categorias de influências e significados resultantes da lógica singular a cada um dos participantes, doze do sexo masculino e sete do sexo feminino; tal disposição demonstrou que a confiança dedicada a outrem é um dos valores centrais à constituição dos princípios ético-morais entre estes jovens. Os resultados obtidos evidenciam a relevância do afeto bem como, e especialmente, da afetividade constituída a partir das relações pessoais próximas e significativas demonstrando a indubitabilidade da influência daqueles com quem são estabelecidos os laços humanos mais genuínos instaurando vínculos potencialmente constituintes das personalidades éticas. / This exploratory qualitative study is based on Educational and Psychological convergent precepts. Our central aim was to identify personal references that could influence moral and ethical values adopted by teenagers. An empirical such as theoretical investigation sought values education in the domain of Moral Psychology looking for a kind of inventory demonstrating admirable characteristics pointed out by nineteen adolescents in the age of seventeen residents of the great São Paulo ABC (reference of the Brazilian trade union movement). The scope was framed by educational influences looking for a kind of privileged ground of interaction between different generations that will hold a reflexive construction of ethical and moral values from about praiseworthy principles. In view of these prerogatives, a central question has guided our research: what kind of influences pass through the constitution of ethical and moral references of the present generation of adolescents? These youngsters third-year high school students by the São Paulo State Public School, twelve males and seven females, were also attended by a socio-educational program of complementary preparation. Composition and organization of them answers to a survey of eight compound questions revealed specificities about moral reasoning of these adolescents demonstrating the uniqueness and complexity way they assume their influences specially considering recent political marches. This data analysis was organized by categories analyzing influences and meanings which results from the singular moral judgment of each of these nineteen participants. Our central results demonstrated that trust committed to proximal others is one of the core values for the constitution of ethical-moral principles among these young people. Therefore out coming evidences confirmed affection relevance as well as, and especially, affectivity constituted from about close and significant personal relationships demonstrating the influence of those with whom the most genuine human bonds are established constituting potentially roots of ethical personalities.

Developmental research on moral psychology has long been driven by the classic studies of Lawrence Kohlberg with an almost exclusive focus on reasoning. The adoption of an evolutionary perspective has opened moral psychology to investigations into the deep roots of morality. From this perspective, it is thought that group living (cooperation), evolved psychological mechanisms, disgust, emotion, and punishment make for the complex building blocks that is morality. Based on this notion, it is quite possible that morality is present early in life and driven by the forces of natural selection. Thus, moral development may be understood by taking a different approach, one that takes into account the tenants of evolution. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of third-party punishment on children’s moral sentiments using a common moral transgression (exclusion from a group). For this cross-sectional study, children in age groups 4-5, 7-8, and 12-13 years heard two short stories describing a perpetrator (matched in gender to the participant) who excludes a victim (also matched in gender to the participant). For each story, children were asked to imagine a different relationship to the victim: kin (i.e., brother or sister) or non-kin (i.e., friend/stranger). After each story, children were asked to rate the intensity of the moral transgression, choose a possible punishment for the perpetrator, identify an emotion associated with the transgression, and then offer a justification for the emotion. A total of 109 children were interviewed for the study. Results were mixed. Relationship (kin vs. non-kin) made a difference in some cases, while not in others. Overall, all children rated the treatment of the victim as wrong, deemed punishment as necessary, and reported neutral emotions. The children in the 12 to 13 age group were different on measures of wrongness and emotional responses. There is some evidence that relationship may influence moral sentiments, which is in line with an evolutionary hypothesis. Moral sentiments seem to be present early, and common moral transgressions are perceived as wrong early and consistently across age groups. This study provides some insight into the evolutionary roots of morality. Additional research is necessary to gain a greater understanding of other factors contributing to the evolutionary roots of morality. / Includes bibliography. / Dissertation (Ph.D.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2019. / FAU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Collection

In contrast to his rationalist predecessors, Kant insists that feeling has a pos- itive role to play in moral life. But the exact nature of this role is far from clear. As much as Kant insists that moral action must proceed from a feeling of respect, he maintains with equal insistence that the objective basis of acting from duty must come from practical reason alone, and that when we act from duty we must exclude sensibility from the determining grounds of choice. In what way, then, is respect for the law a feeling? And what place does this feeling have—if any—in Kant’s ethics? The aim of my dissertation is to answer these questions, in part through a close engagement with Kant’s second Critique. I provide a close reading of his claim that our recognition of the moral law must effect both painful and pleasurable feelings in us, and I argue that these feelings, for Kant, are meant to explain how the moral law can figure into the basis of a maxim. By showing why our recognition of the law must be painful from the perspective of self-love, but pleasurable from the perspective of practical reason, Kant is able to show how our desires can acquire normative direction. On my reading, then, the theory of moral sensibility we find in the second Critique addresses a rather troubling form of skepticism: skepticism about moral motivation.In the course of defending this claim, I provide an alternative reading of the development of Kant’s project of moral justification from Groundwork III to the second Critique. Against a wide-spread view in the literature, I suggest that what changes between these texts is not a direction of argument (from freedom to morality, or morality to freedom), but a methodological shift toward the concept of human sensibility. In the later work, I argue, Kant develops a novel approach to moral feeling from the perspective of the deliberating agent; and this in turn clears room in Kant’s ethics for a new kind of a priori knowledge—namely, knowledge of what the activity of practical reason must feel like. The broader aim of my dissertation is thus to put Kant’s work on meta-ethics and moral psychology in closer proximity.