When Values and Behavior Conflict: Moral Pluralism and Intrapersonal Moral Hypocrisy

One strike and you're a lout: Cherished values increase the stringency of moral character attributions

Moral dilemmas are inescapable in daily life, and people must often choose between two desirable character traits, like being a diligent employee or being a devoted parent. These moral dilemmas arise because people hold competing moral values that sometimes conflict. Furthermore, people differ in which values they prioritize, so we do not always approve of how others resolve moral dilemmas. How are we to think of people who sacrifice one of our most cherished moral values for a value that we consider less important? The "Good True Self Hypothesis" predicts that we will reliably project our most strongly held moral values onto others, even after these people lapse. In other words, people who highly value generosity should consistently expect others to be generous, even after they act frugally in a particular instance. However, reasoning from an error-management perspective instead suggests the "Moral Stringency Hypothesis," which predicts that we should be especially prone to discredit the moral character of people who deviate from our most deeply cherished moral ideals, given the potential costs of affiliating with people who do not reliably adhere to our core moral values. In other words, people who most highly value generosity should be quickest to stop considering others to be generous if they act frugally in a particular instance. Across two studies conducted on Prolific (N = 966), we found consistent evidence that people weight moral lapses more heavily when rating others' membership in highly cherished moral categories, supporting the Moral Stringency Hypothesis. In Study 2, we examined a possible mechanism underlying this phenomenon. Although perceptions of hypocrisy played a role in moral updating, personal moral values and subsequent judgments of a person's potential as a good cooperative partner provided the clearest explanation for changes in moral character attributions. Overall, the robust tendency toward moral stringency carries significant practical and theoretical implications.

Truthfulness Predominates in Americans' Conceptualizations of Honesty: A Prototype Analysis

Honesty is a near universally valued trait. However, the term honesty captures a litany of traits and behaviors, obscuring research on social perceptions and trait measurement of honesty and creating philosophical difficulties in accounting for what (if anything) unifies this diversity. We applied a prototype analysis approach to identify the most central elements of lay honesty conceptualizations, identifying elements that come to mind and are explicitly acknowledged as important to honesty. In five studies (N = 1,442), U.S. American participants generated 6,000+ free responses characterizing honesty and indicated which subtraits and behaviors best represent honesty. Truthfulness was most central to lay honesty conceptualizations across all studies and several centrality indices (frequency among responses and participants, agreement across participants, priority in lists, explicit ratings), though several other features were prominent. Findings illuminate social perceptions of honesty, critique popular measurement of trait honesty, and offer empirical foundations for philosophical analysis of honesty.

A pull versus push framework for reputation

Reputation is a powerful driver of human behavior. Reputation systems incentivize 'actors' to take reputation-enhancing actions, and 'evaluators' to reward actors with positive reputations by preferentially cooperating with them. This article proposes a reputation framework that centers the perspective of evaluators by suggesting that reputation systems can create two fundamentally different incentives for evaluators to reward positive reputations. Evaluators may be pulled towards 'good' actors to benefit directly from their reciprocal cooperation, or pushed to cooperate with such actors by normative pressure. I discuss how psychology and behavior might diverge under pull versus push mechanisms, and use this framework to deepen our understanding of the empirical reputation literature and suggest ways that we may better leverage reputation for social good.

The Puzzle of Evaluating Moral Cognition in Artificial Agents

In developing artificial intelligence (AI), researchers often benchmark against human performance as a measure of progress. Is this kind of comparison possible for moral cognition? Given that human moral judgment often hinges on intangible properties like "intention" which may have no natural analog in artificial agents, it may prove difficult to design a "like-for-like" comparison between the moral behavior of artificial and human agents. What would a measure of moral behavior for both humans and AI look like? We unravel the complexity of this question by discussing examples within reinforcement learning and generative AI, and we examine how the puzzle of evaluating artificial agents' moral cognition remains open for further investigation within cognitive science.

The paucity of morality in everyday talk

Given its centrality in scholarly and popular discourse, morality should be expected to figure prominently in everyday talk. We test this expectation by examining the frequency of moral content in three contexts, using three methods: (a) Participants' subjective frequency estimates (N = 581); (b) Human content analysis of unobtrusively recorded in-person interactions (N = 542 participants; n = 50,961 observations); and (c) Computational content analysis of Facebook posts (N = 3822 participants; n = 111,886 observations). In their self-reports, participants estimated that 21.5% of their interactions touched on morality (Study 1), but objectively, only 4.7% of recorded conversational samples (Study 2) and 2.2% of Facebook posts (Study 3) contained moral content. Collectively, these findings suggest that morality may be far less prominent in everyday life than scholarly and popular discourse, and laypeople, presume.

Who attributes what to whom? Moral values and relational context shape causal attribution to the person or the situation

Eight preregistered studies (total N = 3,758) investigate the role of values and relational context in attributions for moral violations, focusing on the following questions: (1) Do people's values influence their attributions? (2) Do people's relationships with the violator (self, close other, distant other) influence their attributions? (3) Do the principles intrinsic to the violated values (e.g., loyalty to close others) further influence their attributions? We found that participants were more likely to attribute violations by distant others to the person committing the violation, rather than the situation in which the violation occurred, when participants endorsed the violated values themselves. The tendency to make dispositional attributions did not obtain for violations of participants' less highly endorsed moral values or non-moral values. Relationship with the violator also influenced participants' attributions-participants were more likely to attribute their own and close others' moral violations to situational factors, relative to distant others' violations. This relational pattern was pronounced for violations of "binding" moral values, in which protection of personal relationships and groups is primary. Collectively, these results support a relational-values account of causal attribution for moral violations, whereby attributions systematically vary based on (1) the relevance of the violated values to the attributor's moral values, (2) the attributor's personal relationship to the violator, and (3) an interaction between (1) and (2) such that the principles intrinsic to the violated values influence the effects of one's relationship to the violator.

Neural and Cognitive Signatures of Guilt Predict Hypocritical Blame

A common form of moral hypocrisy occurs when people blame others for moral violations that they themselves commit. It is assumed that hypocritical blamers act in this manner to falsely signal that they hold moral standards that they do not really accept. We tested this assumption by investigating the neurocognitive processes of hypocritical blamers during moral decision-making. Participants (62 adult UK residents; 27 males) underwent functional MRI scanning while deciding whether to profit by inflicting pain on others and then judged the blameworthiness of others' identical decisions. Observers (188 adult U.S. residents; 125 males) judged participants who blamed others for making the same harmful choice to be hypocritical, immoral, and untrustworthy. However, analyzing hypocritical blamers' behaviors and neural responses shows that hypocritical blame was positively correlated with conflicted feelings, neural responses to moral standards, and guilt-related neural responses. These findings demonstrate that hypocritical blamers may hold the moral standards that they apply to others.

Double standards in the COVID‐19 pandemic: The moderation of perceived threat

This research explored whether people hold double standards in a public crisis. We proposed that during the COVID‐19 pandemic, people required others to strictly follow self‐quarantine rules and other preventive behaviours, whereas they themselves would not, demonstrating double standards. Moreover, this effect would be moderated by the perceived threat from the pandemic. Using data collected in the United States and China, three studies (N = 2180) tested the hypotheses by measuring (Study 1) and manipulating the perceived threat (Studies 2 and 3). We found that people generally applied higher standards to others than to themselves when it came to following the self‐quarantine rules. This effect was strong when a relatively low threat was perceived, but the self–other difference disappeared when the perceived threat was relatively high, as the demands they placed on themselves would increase as the perceived threat intensified, but their requirements of others would be constantly strict.

Prosocial lies: Causes and consequences

Prosocial lies-lies that are intended to benefit others-are ubiquitous. This article reviews recent research on the causes and consequences of prosocial lies. Prosocial lies are often motivated by the desire to spare others from emotional harm. Therefore, prosocial lies are frequently told in situations in which honesty would cause heightened emotional harm (e.g. when a target is fragile) and by people who are sensitive to others' emotional suffering (e.g. those high in compassion). However, targets only react positively to prosocial lies when they prevent emotional harm and when honesty lacks instrumental value (i.e. when they prevent unnecessary harm). Outside of these situations, targets typically view prosocial lies as paternalistic and therefore penalize those who tell them.

The evolution of morality and the role of commitment

A considerable share of the literature on the evolution of human cooperation considers the question why we have not evolved to play the Nash equilibrium in prisoners' dilemmas or public goods games. In order to understand human morality and pro-social behaviour, we suggest that it would actually be more informative to investigate why we have not evolved to play the subgame perfect Nash equilibrium in sequential games, such as the ultimatum game and the trust game. The 'rationally irrational' behaviour that can evolve in such games gives a much better match with actual human behaviour, including elements of morality such as honesty, responsibility and sincerity, as well as the more hostile aspects of human nature, such as anger and vengefulness. The mechanism at work here is commitment, which does not need population structure, nor does it need interactions to be repeated. We argue that this shift in focus can not only help explain why humans have evolved to know wrong from right, but also why other animals, with similar population structures and similar rates of repetition, have not evolved similar moral sentiments. The suggestion that the evolutionary function of morality is to help us commit to otherwise irrational behaviour stems from the work of Robert Frank (American Economic Review, 77(4), 593-604, 1987; Passions within reason: The strategic role of the emotions, WW Norton, 1988), which has played a surprisingly modest role in the scientific debate to date.

Effects of the Presence and Behavior of In-Group and Out-Group Strangers on Moral Hypocrisy

Moral hypocrisy (MH) occurs when people fail to practice what they preach. Despite the prevalence of the effect of social identity on an individual’s MH, few empirical studies have explored contextual factors that may help reduce MH. By conducting two experiments based on the research paradigm of real stranger presence, we examined how in-group and out-group strangers’ presence and moral behavior may contribute to reducing MH. The results of experiment 1 demonstrated that compared with the presence of out-group strangers, the presence of in-group strangers could effectively inhibit MH (no significant difference between participants reported and actual donation proportions was obtained). The results of experiment 2 replicated and extended the results of experiment 1, first by showing that the presence of in-group strangers could effectively inhibit MH and then by revealing the influence of present strangers’ behavior (moral or hypocritical) on MH. The results indicated that strangers’ moral behavior could effectively eliminate participants’ MH, especially in the presence of in-group strangers. However, when present strangers exhibited hypocritical behavior, they exhibited no effect on participants’ MH, irrespective of the condition of in-group and out-group strangers. The current study provides empirical support for theories related to MH and moral decision-making and contributes to the literature on in-group and out-group effects on MH and decision-making.

Perceiving a Lack of Social Justice: Lower Class Individuals Apply Higher Moral Standards to Others

Four studies ( N = 1,151) examined whether people with lower subjective social classes would be more likely to apply higher moral standards to others than to themselves. With participants from mainland China, Hong Kong, and the United States, we found that people of lower measured or manipulated subjective social classes accepted others’ hypothetical transgressions less than their own transgressions (Studies 1 and 4), and they claimed others should allocate more money to their partners in a dictator game than they themselves did (Studies 2 and 3). This effect was mediated by perceived injustice (Study 3) and eliminated when the perceived social justice was boosted (Study 4). Higher class individuals did not show such discrepant self–other moral standards. A mini meta-analysis validates the reliability of the findings that only lower class individuals demonstrate double moral standards. Therefore, lower class individuals may increase moral requirements on others as a reaction to their perceived unjust disadvantages.

Pointing fingers at others: The neural correlates of actor-observer asymmetry in blame attribution

People tend to describe others' immoral behaviors as intentional and dispositional, and their own as unintentional events. The actor-observer asymmetry might reflect at least true attitudes potentially free from intentional faking. Implicit attitudes - i.e., automatic evaluation of the rightness or wrongness of actions - play a central role in guiding moral decision-making. Yet, little research has investigated how value computations are associated with actor-observer asymmetry of moral decision-making. In this fMRI study, we developed the morally-laden implicit association test (mIAT) to examine the extent to which implicit attitudes are predictive of online neural response when participants mentally simulate or passively observe morally-laden behaviors such as helping or harming others. Results showed that the scores on the mIAT were predictive of actor-observer asymmetry when attributing blame for immoral behavior, associated with neural responses in the orbitofrontal cortex and temporal pole. The asymmetry between first-hand experiencing and passive viewing moral behavior recruited the activity in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and right temporoparietal junction. These findings indicate that implicit moral attitudes can predict moral evaluation and neural responses to asymmetry between experiencing and observing injustice. They provide important knowledge regarding the individual differences involved in the computational mechanisms underlying how implicit attitudes guide moral decision-making.

Modeling Morality in 3-D: Decision-Making, Judgment, and Inference

Humans face a fundamental challenge of how to balance selfish interests against moral considerations. Such trade-offs are implicit in moral decisions about what to do; judgments of whether an action is morally right or wrong; and inferences about the moral character of others. To date, these three dimensions of moral cognition-decision-making, judgment, and inference-have been studied largely independently, using very different experimental paradigms. However, important aspects of moral cognition occur at the intersection of multiple dimensions; for instance, moral hypocrisy can be conceived as a disconnect between moral decisions and moral judgments. Here we describe the advantages of investigating these three dimensions of moral cognition within a single computational framework. A core component of this framework is harm aversion, a moral sentiment defined as a distaste for harming others. The framework integrates economic utility models of harm aversion with Bayesian reinforcement learning models describing beliefs about others' harm aversion. We show how this framework can provide novel insights into the mechanisms of moral decision-making, judgment, and inference.

Are Proselfs More Deceptive and Hypocritical? Social Image Concerns in Appearing Fair

Deception varies across individuals and social contexts. The present research explored how individual difference measured by social value orientations, and situations, affect deception in moral hypocrisy. In two experiments, participants made allocations between themselves and recipients with an opportunity to deceive recipients where recipients cannot reject their allocations. Experiment 1 demonstrated that proselfs were more deceptive and hypocritical than prosocials by lying to be apparently fair, especially when deception was unrevealed. Experiment 2 showed that proselfs were more concerned about social image in deception in moral hypocrisy than prosocials were. They decreased apparent fairness when deception was revealed and evaluated by a third-party reviewer and increased it when deception was evaluated but unrevealed. These results show that prosocials and proselfs differed in pursuing deception and moral hypocrisy social goals and provide implications for decreasing deception and moral hypocrisy.

Morality and Self-Control: How They Are Intertwined and Where They Differ

Despite sharing conceptual overlap, morality and self-control research have led largely separate lives. In this article, we highlight neglected connections between these major areas of psychology. To this end, we first note their conceptual similarities and differences. We then show how morality research, typically emphasizing aspects of moral cognition and emotion, may benefit from incorporating motivational concepts from self-control research. Similarly, self-control research may benefit from a better understanding of the moral nature of many self-control domains. We place special focus on various components of self-control and on the ways in which self-control goals may come to be seen as moral issues (i.e., moralized).

Stimulating the Right Temporoparietal Junction with tDCS Decreases Deception in Moral Hypocrisy and Unfairness

Self-centered and other-regarding concerns play important roles in decisions of deception. To investigate how these two motivations affect deception in fairness related moral hypocrisy, we modulated the brain activity in the right temporoparietal junction (rTPJ), the key region for decision making involved in self-centered and other-regarding concerns. After receiving brain stimulation with transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), participants finished a modified dictator game. In the game, they played as proposers to make allocations between themselves and recipients and had a chance to deceive by misreporting their totals for allocations. Results show that deception in moral hypocrisy was decreased after anodal stimulation than sham and cathodal stimulation, only when participants know that their reported totals (appearing fair) would be revealed to recipients rather than being unrevealed. Anodal stimulation also increased offers to recipients than cathodal stimulation regardless of the revelation of reported totals. These findings suggest that enhancing the activity of rTPJ decreased deception caused by impression management rather than self-deception in moral hypocrisy and unfairness through facilitating other-regarding concerns and weakening non-material self-centered motivations. They provide causal evidence for the role of rTPJ in both other-regarding concerns and non-material self-centered motivations, shedding light on the way to decrease moral hypocrisy.

Disharmony in New Harmony: insights from the narcissistic leadership of Robert Owen

Purpose

The purpose of this study is to narratively explore the influence of leader narcissism on leader/follower social exchange. Moreover, while researchers acknowledge that narcissistic personality is a dimensional construct, the preponderance of extant literature approaches the concept of narcissistic leadership categorically by focusing on the reactive or constructive narcissistic extremes. This bimodal emphasis ignores self-deceptive forms of narcissistic leadership, where vision orientation and communication could differ from leaders with more reactive or constructive narcissistic personalities.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors argue that they encountered a compelling example of a communal, self-deceiving narcissist during archival research of Robert Owen’s collective experiment at New Harmony, Indiana. To explore Owen’s narcissistic leadership, they utilize an analytically structured history approach to interpret his leadership, as he conveyed his vision of social reform in America.

Findings

Approaching data from a ‘history to theory’ perspective and via a communicative lens, the authors use insights from their abductive analysis to advance a cross-paradigm, communication-centered process model of narcissistic leadership that accounts for the full dimensional nature of leader narcissism and the relational aspects of narcissistic leadership.

Research limitations/implications

Scholars maintaining a positivist stance might consider this method a limitation, as historical case-based research places greater emphasis on reflexivity than replication. However, from a constructionist perspective, a focus on generalization might be considered inappropriate or premature, potentially hampering the revelation of insights.

Originality/value

Through a multi-paradigmatic analysis of the historical case of Robert Owen and his visionary communal experiment at New Harmony, the authors contribute to the extant literature by elaborating a comprehensive, dimensional and relational process framework of narcissistic leadership. In doing so, the authors have heeded calls to better delineate leader narcissism, embrace process and relational aspects of leadership and consider leader communication as constitutive of leadership.