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Intuition and Moral Decision-Making - The Effect of Time Pressure and Cognitive Load on Moral Judgment and Altruistic Behavior.

ABSTRACT: Do individuals intuitively favor certain moral actions over others? This study explores the role of intuitive thinking-induced by time pressure and cognitive load-in moral judgment and behavior. We conduct experiments in three different countries (Sweden, Austria, and the United States) involving over 1,400 subjects. All subjects responded to four trolley type dilemmas and four dictator games involving different charitable causes. Decisions were made under time pressure/time delay or while experiencing cognitive load or control. Overall we find converging evidence that intuitive states do not influence moral decisions. Neither time-pressure nor cognitive load had any effect on moral judgments or altruistic behavior. Thus we find no supporting evidence for the claim that intuitive moral judgments and dictator game giving differ from more reflectively taken decisions. Across all samples and decision tasks men were more likely to make utilitarian moral judgments and act selfishly compared to women, providing further evidence that there are robust gender differences in moral decision-making. However, there were no significant interactions between gender and the treatment manipulations of intuitive versus reflective decision-making.

SUBMITTER: Tinghog G

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5082681 | biostudies-literature | 2016

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Intuition and Moral Decision-Making - The Effect of Time Pressure and Cognitive Load on Moral Judgment and Altruistic Behavior.

Tinghög Gustav G Andersson David D Bonn Caroline C Johannesson Magnus M Kirchler Michael M Koppel Lina L Västfjäll Daniel D

PloS one 20161026 10

Do individuals intuitively favor certain moral actions over others? This study explores the role of intuitive thinking-induced by time pressure and cognitive load-in moral judgment and behavior. We conduct experiments in three different countries (Sweden, Austria, and the United States) involving over 1,400 subjects. All subjects responded to four trolley type dilemmas and four dictator games involving different charitable causes. Decisions were made under time pressure/time delay or while exper ...[more]

PMID: 27783704

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Project description:While extensive research has been conducted on adults' judgments in moral sacrificial dilemmas, there is little research on adolescents. The present study aimed at: (1) adding further empirical evidence about adolescents' moral decisions (deontological vs. utilitarian) in sacrificial moral dilemmas and (2) investigating how these moral decisions relate with gender, school grade, emotional traits (callous-unemotional traits), context-related experiences (perceived parental rejection and community violence exposure), and moral-related factors (moral disengagement and universalism value). A sample of 755 Italian adolescents (54.7% females; Mean age=16.45, SD=1.61) attending the second and the fifth year of secondary school took part in the study. Two sacrificial trolley-type dilemmas (where harmful actions promote the greater good) were presented. In the "switch" scenario (impersonal sacrificial dilemma), the choice is whether to hit a switch to save five people killing only one person. In the "footbridge" scenario (personal sacrificial dilemma), the choice is whether to push a large man off a footbridge saving five persons. For each scenario, participants had to indicate whether the proposed action was "morally acceptable" or not. Data were analyzed performing generalized linear mixed models. Our results showed that: (1) Adolescents were more likely to indicate as admissible to hit the switch rather than to push the large man; (2) male adolescents, compared to females, were more likely to say it was morally acceptable to intervene in the footbridge dilemma, whereas younger adolescents said it was morally acceptable both in the switch and the footbridge situations; and (3) higher levels of callous-unemotional traits, perceived parental rejection, and moral disengagement, on the one hand, and lower levels of universalism, on the other hand, were associated to higher admissibility to intervene in the footbridge scenario. Higher community violence exposure was associated with a lower propensity to intervene in the switch scenario. Overall, the present study expands the research on sacrificial dilemmas involving a sample of adolescents. The findings support previous studies concerning the role of emotions in making moral decisions but, at the same, open new perspectives regarding the role of contextual experiences and moral-related factors.

Project description:Moral distress is common among critical care physicians and can impact negatively healthcare individuals and institutions. Better understanding inter-individual variability in moral distress is needed to inform future wellness interventions.ObjectivesTo explore when and how critical care physicians experience moral distress in the workplace and its consequences, how physicians' professional interactions with colleagues affected their perceived level of moral distress, and in which circumstances professional rewards were experienced and mitigated moral distress.DesignInterview-based qualitative study using inductive thematic analysis.Setting and participantsTwenty critical care physicians practicing in Canadian ICUs who expressed interest in participating in a semi-structured interview after completion of a national, cross-sectional survey of moral distress in ICU physicians.ResultsStudy participants described different ways to perceive and resolve morally challenging clinical situations, which were grouped into four clinical moral orientations: virtuous, resigned, deferring, and empathic. Moral orientations resulted from unique combinations of strength of personal moral beliefs and perceived power over moral clinical decision-making, which led to different rationales for moral decision-making. Study findings illustrate how sociocultural, legal, and clinical contexts influenced individual physicians' moral orientation and how moral orientation altered perceived moral distress and moral satisfaction. The degree of dissonance between individual moral orientations within care team determined, in part, the quantity of "negative judgments" and/or "social support" that physicians obtained from their colleagues. The levels of moral distress, moral satisfaction, social judgment, and social support ultimately affected the type and severity of the negative consequences experienced by ICU physicians.Conclusions and relevanceAn expanded understanding of moral orientations provides an additional tool to address the problem of moral distress in the critical care setting. Diversity in moral orientations may explain, in part, the variability in moral distress levels among clinicians and likely contributes to interpersonal conflicts in the ICU setting. Additional investigations on different moral orientations in various clinical environments are much needed to inform the design of effective systemic and institutional interventions that address healthcare professionals' moral distress and mitigate its negative consequences.

Dataset Information

Intuition and Moral Decision-Making - The Effect of Time Pressure and Cognitive Load on Moral Judgment and Altruistic Behavior.

Publications

Intuition and Moral Decision-Making - The Effect of Time Pressure and Cognitive Load on Moral Judgment and Altruistic Behavior.

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