1
|
Zhu X, Huang Y, Liu W, Yu Z, Duan Y, He X, Zhang W. Keeping Morality "on the Straight" and Never "on the Bend": Metaphorical Representations of Moral Concepts in Straightness and Curvature. Behav Sci (Basel) 2023; 13:bs13040295. [PMID: 37102809 PMCID: PMC10136358 DOI: 10.3390/bs13040295] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/18/2023] [Revised: 03/16/2023] [Accepted: 03/21/2023] [Indexed: 04/28/2023] Open
Abstract
The study of moral conceptual metaphors has been an important topic in recent years. In Chinese culture, the concepts of curvature and straightness are given certain semantic contents, in which curvature refers to being sly while straightness refers to having integrity. In the present study, we used the Implicit Association Test (IAT) paradigm (Experiment 1) and the Stroop paradigm (Experiment 2) to investigate whether there are metaphorical representations of curvature and straightness in moral concepts. The results revealed that the mean reaction time in compatible trials (i.e., moral words accompanied by a straight pattern and immoral words accompanied by a curved pattern) was significantly shorter than that in incompatible trials (i.e., moral words accompanied by a curved pattern and immoral words accompanied by a straight pattern). The Stroop paradigm showed that reaction times were significantly reduced when moral words were presented in a straight font, but there was no significant difference between the presentation of immoral words in a straight font and that in a curved font. The results suggest that mental representations of moral concepts are associated with straightness and curvature in Chinese culture.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Xiaoyan Zhu
- Center for Studies of Psychological Application, Key Laboratory of Brain, Cognition and Education Sciences, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510631, China
- Ministry of Education, Guangdong Key Laboratory of Mental Health and Cognitive Science, School of Psychology, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510631, China
| | - Yanbing Huang
- Center for Studies of Psychological Application, Key Laboratory of Brain, Cognition and Education Sciences, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510631, China
- Ministry of Education, Guangdong Key Laboratory of Mental Health and Cognitive Science, School of Psychology, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510631, China
| | - Wenxuan Liu
- Center for Studies of Psychological Application, Key Laboratory of Brain, Cognition and Education Sciences, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510631, China
- Ministry of Education, Guangdong Key Laboratory of Mental Health and Cognitive Science, School of Psychology, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510631, China
| | - Zhao Yu
- Center for Studies of Psychological Application, Key Laboratory of Brain, Cognition and Education Sciences, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510631, China
- Ministry of Education, Guangdong Key Laboratory of Mental Health and Cognitive Science, School of Psychology, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510631, China
| | - Yan Duan
- Center for Studies of Psychological Application, Key Laboratory of Brain, Cognition and Education Sciences, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510631, China
- Ministry of Education, Guangdong Key Laboratory of Mental Health and Cognitive Science, School of Psychology, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510631, China
| | - Xianyou He
- Center for Studies of Psychological Application, Key Laboratory of Brain, Cognition and Education Sciences, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510631, China
- Ministry of Education, Guangdong Key Laboratory of Mental Health and Cognitive Science, School of Psychology, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510631, China
- Key Laboratory of Chinese Learning and International Promotion, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510631, China
| | - Wei Zhang
- Center for Studies of Psychological Application, Key Laboratory of Brain, Cognition and Education Sciences, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510631, China
- Ministry of Education, Guangdong Key Laboratory of Mental Health and Cognitive Science, School of Psychology, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510631, China
| |
Collapse
|
2
|
Chen T, Tang R, Yang X, Peng M, Cai M. Moral transgression modulates fairness considerations in the ultimatum game: Evidence from ERP and EEG data. Int J Psychophysiol 2023; 188:1-11. [PMID: 36889599 DOI: 10.1016/j.ijpsycho.2023.03.001] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/19/2022] [Revised: 02/22/2023] [Accepted: 03/01/2023] [Indexed: 03/08/2023]
Abstract
People tend to dislike and punish unfair behaviors in social interactions, and this disposition may be moderated by the characteristics of their interaction partner. We used a modified ultimatum game (UG) to investigate players' responses to fair and unfair offers from proposers described as having performed either a moral transgression or a neutral behavior, and recorded an electroencephalogram. The participants' behavior in the UG suggests that people quickly demand more fairness from proposers who have committed moral transgressions rather than neutral behavior. Event-related potentials (ERPs) revealed a significant effect of offer type and of proposer type on P300 activity. The prestimulus α-oscillation power in the neutral behavior condition was significantly lower than that in the moral transgression condition. The post-stimulus β-event-related synchronization (β-ERS) was larger for the moral transgression condition than the neutral behavior condition in response to the least fair offers, and larger for neutral behavior than the moral transgression condition in response to the fairest offers. In summary, β-ERS was influenced by both proposer type and offer type, which revealed different neural responses to the offer from either a morally transgressive or a neutral behavior proposer.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Tianlong Chen
- Key Laboratory of Adolescent Cyberpsychology and Behavior of the Ministry of Education and School of Psychology, Central China Normal University, Wuhan, China; School of Psychology, Central China Normal University, Wuhan, China
| | - Rui Tang
- Key Laboratory of Adolescent Cyberpsychology and Behavior of the Ministry of Education and School of Psychology, Central China Normal University, Wuhan, China; School of Psychology, Central China Normal University, Wuhan, China
| | - Xiaoying Yang
- Key Laboratory of Adolescent Cyberpsychology and Behavior of the Ministry of Education and School of Psychology, Central China Normal University, Wuhan, China; School of Psychology, Central China Normal University, Wuhan, China
| | - Ming Peng
- Key Laboratory of Adolescent Cyberpsychology and Behavior of the Ministry of Education and School of Psychology, Central China Normal University, Wuhan, China; School of Psychology, Central China Normal University, Wuhan, China; Key Laboratory of Human Development and Mental Health of Hubei Province, Wuhan 430079, China.
| | - Mengfei Cai
- Department of Psychology, Manhattanville College, New York, NY, USA
| |
Collapse
|
3
|
Chen T, Li Q, Peng M, Li X. Moral transgression modulates empathy for pain: Evidence from ERP and EEG data. Biol Psychol 2023; 176:108467. [PMID: 36455804 DOI: 10.1016/j.biopsycho.2022.108467] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/12/2022] [Revised: 11/24/2022] [Accepted: 11/25/2022] [Indexed: 11/29/2022]
Abstract
Empathy for others' pain plays a critical role in human social interactions; however, the influence of moral transgression remains unclear. We examined the effect of moral transgression on the behavioral and underlying neural processes of empathy for others' pain. Participants performed a pain-empathy task separately in a moral transgression condition and a neutral behavior condition, while an electroencephalogram was recorded. Event-related potential (ERP) results showed that empathic response, as reflected in the late positive component, was smaller when participants performed the task in the moral transgression condition than in the neutral behavior condition. Time-frequency results also showed decreased empathic effect on the beta event-related desynchronization response in the moral transgression as compared to the neutral behavior condition. However, empathic response as reflected in the N2 component was comparable between the moral conditions. These findings demonstrate a moral transgression effect on both cognitive evaluations and sensorimotor processes of empathy for others' pain. Furthermore, spontaneous alpha-oscillation power recorded prior to the onset of empathy-inducing stimuli was significantly higher in the moral transgression condition than in the neutral behavior condition. Consequently, differences in sustained attention may be the physiological foundation of the impact of moral transgression of the observed person on the cognitive and sensorimotor processes of empathy for pain.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Tianlong Chen
- School of Psychology, Central China Normal University, Wuhan, China
| | - Qianqian Li
- School of Psychology, Central China Normal University, Wuhan, China
| | - Ming Peng
- School of Psychology, Central China Normal University, Wuhan, China; Key Laboratory of Adolescent Cyberpsychology and Behavior of the Ministry of Education and School of Psychology, Central China Normal University, Wuhan, China.
| | - Xu Li
- School of Psychology, Central China Normal University, Wuhan, China; Key Laboratory of Adolescent Cyberpsychology and Behavior of the Ministry of Education and School of Psychology, Central China Normal University, Wuhan, China
| |
Collapse
|
4
|
Bigelow FJ, Clark GM, Lum JAG, Enticott PG. Moral content influences facial emotion processing development during early-to-middle childhood. Neuropsychologia 2022; 176:108372. [PMID: 36155775 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2022.108372] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/17/2021] [Revised: 08/14/2022] [Accepted: 09/19/2022] [Indexed: 11/19/2022]
Abstract
Facial emotions are often processed in light of moral information, which can assist in predicting and interpreting the intentions of another. Neurophysiological measures of facial emotion processing (FEP) may be sensitive to moral content. Relatively little is known, however, about the relationship between moral content and FEP during early-to-middle childhood, and how this relationship may change across development. Eighty-four children aged 4-12 years completed a task assessing whether child faces primed within the moral harm/care domain influenced face sensitive event-related potentials (ERPs; N170 and LPP). Results demonstrated that N170 amplitude decreased with age for faces primed with positive moral content, whilst LPP amplitude decreased with age for faces primed with negative moral content. Collectively, this suggests that morally relevant content within the harm/care domain is integrated during the early stages of FEP in early-to-middle childhood. Moreover, stronger language ability was positively correlated with the LPP for fearful faces primed with negative moral content. Overall, findings provide novel evidence to suggest that FEP development may be modulated by moral content, and emotion-specific results may be influenced by language. Findings from this research highlight the complex relationship between broader social cognitive skills during child development.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Felicity J Bigelow
- Cognitive Neuroscience Unit, School of Psychology, Deakin University, 221 Burwood Highway, Burwood, Victoria, Geelong, Australia, 3121.
| | - Gillian M Clark
- Cognitive Neuroscience Unit, School of Psychology, Deakin University, 221 Burwood Highway, Burwood, Victoria, Geelong, Australia, 3121
| | - Jarrad A G Lum
- Cognitive Neuroscience Unit, School of Psychology, Deakin University, 221 Burwood Highway, Burwood, Victoria, Geelong, Australia, 3121
| | - Peter G Enticott
- Cognitive Neuroscience Unit, School of Psychology, Deakin University, 221 Burwood Highway, Burwood, Victoria, Geelong, Australia, 3121
| |
Collapse
|
5
|
Tao D, Leng Y, Huo J, Peng S, Xu J, Deng H. Effects of Core Disgust and Moral Disgust on Moral Judgment: An Event-Related Potential Study. Front Psychol 2022; 13:806784. [PMID: 35783761 PMCID: PMC9242396 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.806784] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/01/2021] [Accepted: 03/21/2022] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Core disgust is elicited by physical or chemical stimuli, while moral disgust is evoked by abstract violations of moral norms. Although previous studies have pointed out these two types of disgust can affect behavior and spatial dimensions of moral judgment, less is known about how moral and core disgust affect the temporal neural processing of moral judgment. In addition, whether moral and core disgust are only related to purity-based moral judgment or all kinds of moral judgment is still controversial. This study aimed to explore how core and moral disgust affect the neural processing of purity-based moral judgment by using affective priming and moral judgment tasks. The behavioral results showed that the severity of moral violation of non-purity ones is higher than purity ones. The event-related potentials (ERP) results mainly revealed that earlier P2 and N2 components, which represent the automatic moral processes, can differentiate neutral and two types of disgust rather than differentiating moral domain, while the later N450, frontal, and parietal LPP components, which represent the conflict detection and, later, cognitive processing can differentiate the purity and non-purity ones rather than differentiating priming type. Moreover, core and moral disgust priming mainly differed in the purity-based moral processing indexed by parietal LPP. Our findings confirmed that the disgusting effect on moral judgments can be explained within the framework of dual-process and social intuitionist models, suggesting that emotions, including core and moral disgust, played an essential role in the automatic intuition process. The later parietal LPP results strongly supported that core disgust only affected the purity-based moral judgment, fitting the primary purity hypothesis well. We show how these theories can provide novel insights into the temporal mechanisms of moral judgment.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Dan Tao
- School of Biological Science and Medical Engineering, Southeast University, Nanjing, China
- Research Center for Learning Science, Southeast University, Nanjing, China
- Key Laboratory of Child Development and Learning Science of Ministry of Education, Southeast University, Nanjing, China
| | - Yue Leng
- School of Biological Science and Medical Engineering, Southeast University, Nanjing, China
- Research Center for Learning Science, Southeast University, Nanjing, China
- Key Laboratory of Child Development and Learning Science of Ministry of Education, Southeast University, Nanjing, China
| | - Jiamin Huo
- School of Biological Science and Medical Engineering, Southeast University, Nanjing, China
- Research Center for Learning Science, Southeast University, Nanjing, China
- Key Laboratory of Child Development and Learning Science of Ministry of Education, Southeast University, Nanjing, China
| | - Suhao Peng
- School of Biological Science and Medical Engineering, Southeast University, Nanjing, China
- Research Center for Learning Science, Southeast University, Nanjing, China
- Key Laboratory of Child Development and Learning Science of Ministry of Education, Southeast University, Nanjing, China
| | - Jing Xu
- Department of Psychology, College of Literature, Science, and the Arts (LSA), University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, United States
| | - Huihua Deng
- School of Biological Science and Medical Engineering, Southeast University, Nanjing, China
- Research Center for Learning Science, Southeast University, Nanjing, China
- Key Laboratory of Child Development and Learning Science of Ministry of Education, Southeast University, Nanjing, China
| |
Collapse
|