I recently read “A moral trade-off system produces intuitive judgments that are rational and coherent and strike a balance between conflicting moral values” (Guzman et al, 2022). Here’s a simplified version of the authors’ thesis:
Intuitions about right and wrong clash in moral dilemmas. These dilemmas activate a moral trade-off system designed for resolving conflicts among moral values. Examples of moral values include fairness, reciprocity, responsibility, care, entitlement, merit, loyalty, and honesty. When asked to resolve moral dilemmas, many people made compromise judgments, which strike a balance between conflicting moral values by partially satisfying at least some of them. The moral tradeoff system delivers that solution as an intuitive moral judgment.
We face moral dilemmas all the time. For example, if a poor relative asks for financial assistance, my first impulse is likely to agree (care) but then I think his current predicament is the result of bad decisions on his part (responsibility) and that if I loan him money, he may not pay me back (honesty and reciprocity) or he may even be encouraged to keep making bad choices, so I’m not really helping and may actually be making thing worse by protecting him from the effects of his own choices and so would be doing more harm in the long run, both to my hapless relative and those who depend on him (fairness to others).
With that in mind, here’s an old post.
Original Post: Behind the Science: When Left and Right Agree about Who Deserves Government Benefits
Don’t think!
Imagine you’re a study participant, in which the researchers present you with descriptions of various welfare* recipients, each description followed by the question, “Should this person be required to do more to continue receiving benefits, such as look for work or get job training?” You will also be asked how you feel about each recipient, especially if you feel anger or compassion.
If you’re assigned to the control condition, the descriptions will be vague:
A young man
A woman in her fifties
An old man
A man who receives social welfare benefits.
If you’re assigned to a “treatment” condition, the descriptions will include additional details:
A young man who could get a job if he wanted to
A woman in her fifties with a work-related injury
An old man who has been in the labour market all his life
A man who receives social welfare benefits. He has never had a regular job, but he is fit and healthy. He is not motivated to get a job.
A man who receives social welfare benefits. He has always had a regular job, but has now been the victim of a work-related injury. He is very motivated to get back to work again.
Similar studies have been done in Denmark and the US. Despite differences in political culture, Danish and American participants weren’t all that different in their responses. Here are some findings:
Participants’ political leanings influenced their responses only when descriptions of welfare recipients were vague, in which case:
Leftward-leaning participants reported more compassion towards welfare recipients and were less likely to require they do more in order to continue receiving their benefits
Rightward-leaning participants reported more anger towards recipients and were more likely to require they do more to continue receiving benefits.
When provided with detailed descriptions of welfare recipients and regardless of political leanings, participants reported:
Anger at individuals depicted as physically fit but unmotivated to work.
Compassion towards those perceived as unlucky, e.g., if they suffered a work injury..
Compassion for individuals who had already worked for a good portion of their adult lives or were motivated to work.
Regardless of political leaning, participants who reported anger at individual recipients were more likely to endorse stricter requirements for continuation of their benefits.
According to the researchers, these emotional reactions are understandable in the context of human evolution. Human emotions evolved to help our ancestors survive and reproduce during a time when conditions were brutal. Emotional reactions served to reinforce behaviors necessary for individual and group survival: warm fuzzies for individuals who demonstrated a willingness to put in the effort, reciprocate, and cooperate; and anger for individuals deemed lazy, selfish or uncooperative.
We default to political bias in the absence of detailed information. But when adequately informed, we react in very similar ways. Perhaps that’s why “fake news” and “fact-checking” are so important these days: control the details people are exposed to and you control their emotions and opinions.
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* “Welfare” is being used here as a catch-all term for various benefit programs that provide financial assistance to individuals in need.
References:
Aarøe, L. and M. B. Petersen (2014). Cues Crowding Out Culture: Scandinavians and Americans Agree on Social Welfare in the Face of Deservingness The Journal of Politics 76(3): 684-697.
Guzmán RA, Barbato MT, Sznycer D, Cosmides L. A moral trade-off system produces intuitive judgments that are rational and coherent and strike a balance between conflicting moral values Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences U S A. 2022 Oct 18;119 (42):e2214005119. Doi: 10.1073/pnas.2214005119
Petersen, MB, Slothuus, R, Studager, R and Togeby, L (2011) Deservingness versus values in public opinion on welfare: The automaticity of the deservingness heuristic. European Journal of Political Research, 50: 24-52.
Petersen, M. B., Sznycer, D. , Cosmides, L. and Tooby, J. (2012), Who Deserves Help? Evolutionary Psychology, Social Emotions, and Public Opinion about Welfare. Political Psychology, 33: 395-418.