Department of Psychology, Yale University, New Haven, CT 06520
Department of Psychology, Yale University, New Haven, CT 06520.
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2018 Jan 23;115(4):E592-E600. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1714945115. Epub 2018 Jan 8.
The preference for morality in others is regarded as a dominant factor in person perception. Moral traits are thought to foster liking, and immoral traits are thought to foster disliking, irrespective of the context in which they are embedded. We report the results of four studies that oppose this view. Using both explicit and implicit measures, we found that the preference for morality vs. immorality in others is conditional on the evaluator's current goals. Specifically, when immorality was conducive to participants' current goals, the preference for moral vs. immoral traits in others was eliminated or reversed. The preferences for mercifulness vs. mercilessness (experiment 1), honesty vs. dishonesty (experiment 2), sexual fidelity vs. infidelity (experiment 3), and altruism vs. selfishness (experiment 4) were all found to be conditional. These findings oppose the consensus view that people have a dominant preference for moral vs. immoral traits in others. Our findings also speak to nativist and empiricist theories of social preferences and the stability of the "social contract" underlying productive human societies.
人们普遍认为，对他人道德品质的偏好是人际感知的主要因素。人们认为，道德特征会促进喜欢，不道德特征会促进厌恶，而不论这些特征所处的环境如何。我们报告了四项研究的结果，这些研究结果与上述观点相悖。通过使用显性和隐性测量方法，我们发现，对他人的道德和不道德的偏好取决于评估者的当前目标。具体来说，当不道德行为有助于参与者的当前目标时，对他人的道德和不道德特征的偏好就会消失或反转。对仁慈与残忍（实验 1）、诚实与欺骗（实验 2）、性忠贞与性不忠（实验 3）以及利他主义与自私自利（实验 4）的偏好都是有条件的。这些发现与人们普遍认为的对他人的道德和不道德特征有主导偏好的观点相悖。我们的研究结果还涉及社会偏好的自然主义和经验主义理论以及构成富有成效的人类社会基础的“社会契约”的稳定性。
