Department of Psychology, University of Oregon
Department of Psychology, Harvard University.
Psychol Sci. 2014 Aug;25(8):1563-70. doi: 10.1177/0956797614534693. Epub 2014 Jun 10.
If free-will beliefs support attributions of moral responsibility, then reducing these beliefs should make people less retributive in their attitudes about punishment. Four studies tested this prediction using both measured and manipulated free-will beliefs. Study 1 found that people with weaker free-will beliefs endorsed less retributive, but not consequentialist, attitudes regarding punishment of criminals. Subsequent studies showed that learning about the neural bases of human behavior, through either lab-based manipulations or attendance at an undergraduate neuroscience course, reduced people's support for retributive punishment (Studies 2-4). These results illustrate that exposure to debates about free will and to scientific research on the neural basis of behavior may have consequences for attributions of moral responsibility.
如果自由意志信仰支持对道德责任的归因，那么减少这些信仰应该会使人们在对待惩罚时的报复态度降低。四项研究使用测量和操纵的自由意志信仰来检验这一预测。研究 1 发现，自由意志信仰较弱的人对罪犯的惩罚持较少报复性、但不支持后果主义的态度。随后的研究表明，通过实验室操作或参加本科神经科学课程了解人类行为的神经基础，会减少人们对报复性惩罚的支持（研究 2-4）。这些结果表明，接触关于自由意志的辩论以及关于行为神经基础的科学研究可能会对道德责任的归因产生影响。
