Behavioral norms for condensed moral vignettes
Open accessAbstract
Moral judgment is an evaluation of the actions and character of a person made with respect to societal norms. Although many types of vignettes have been used in previous studies on moral beliefs and judgment, what is missing is a set of standardized common vignettes based in real life. The goal of this study was to provide researchers with stimuli that have values on several dimensions pertaining to moral judgment and whose underlying components are known. These values will allow researchers to select stimuli based on standardized ratings rather than on the results of pilot studies, while avoiding the limitations of the classic, abstract moral scenarios. Our study was composed of three phases, (i) collecting and shortening the vignettes, (ii) obtaining ratings of the vignettes on several dimensions including emotional intensity, degree of social norm violation, and level of harm or benefit caused and (iii) determining the underlying components of the vignettes by performing a factor analysis. We found three components that accounted for most of the variance: norm violation, social affect and intention. The resulting vignettes can be used in future parametric studies on moral judgment in behavioral, neuropsychological and functional imaging experiments.
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The experimental tasks used might only partially involve the mental processes guiding real-life moral behavior.
“That is, the experimental tasks used might only partially involve the mental processes guiding real-life moral behavior (cf. Cima et al. 2010; Knutson et al. 2010; Young et al. 2010a).”
From Parsing the neural correlates of moral cognition: ALE meta-analysis on morality, theory of mind, and empathy (2012) · cites this paper as Knutson et al. 2010
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- Stroebe, M.H.W, editors. European Review of Social Psychology, Vol. 11. London: Wiley, pp. 297-331.
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- Authors
- Knutson, K. M., Krueger, F., Koenigs, M., Hawley, A., Escobedo, J. R., Vasudeva, V., Adolphs, R., & Grafman, J.
- Affiliations
- National Institutes of Health (US)
- University of Wisconsin–Madison (US)
- California Institute of Technology (US)
- Augusta University (US)
- Corresponding author
- Grafman, Jordan
- Venue
- Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience
- Publisher
- Oxford University Press (OUP)
- Published
- 2010-02-12
- Volume
- 5
- Issue
- 4
- Pages
- 378-384
- ISSN
- 1749-5016 (ISSN-L)
- 1749-5024
- PMC
- PMC2999756
- OpenAlex
- W2154981204
- Cited by
- 66
- References
- 42
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 5 · 2024: 4 · 2023: 7 · 2022: 8 · 2021: 4 · 2020: 1 · 2019: 2 · 2018: 3 · 2017: 7 · 2016: 3 · 2015: 5 · 2014: 5 · 2013: 3 · 2012: 3
- FWCI
- 1.74
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Licence
- cc-by-nc
- Locations
- Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- CaltechAUTHORS (California Institute of Technology) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institutes of Health
- National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Psychology of Moral and Emotional Judgment
- Social Sciences › Decision Sciences › Information Systems and Management › Ethics in Business and Education
- Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › Philosophy › Philosophical Ethics and Theory
- Keywords
- moral judgment, behavioral norms, social norms violation, emotional intensity, benefits and harms, intention, ethical dilemmas
- MeSH terms
- Adult, Brain, Cues, Emotions, Factor Analysis, Statistical, Female, Humans, Judgment, Male, Middle Aged, Morals, Psychological Tests, Social Perception, Moral Obligations
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