Morality: An Evolutionary Account

ABSTRACT— Refinements in Darwin's theory of the origin of a moral sense create a framework equipped to organize and integrate contemporary theory and research on morality. Morality originated in deferential, cooperative, and altruistic "social instincts," or decision-making strategies, that enabled early humans to maximize their gains from social living and resolve their conflicts of interest in adaptive ways. Moral judgments, moral norms, and conscience originated from strategic interactions among members of groups who experienced confluences and conflicts of interest. Moral argumentation buttressed by moral reasoning is equipped to generate universal and impartial moral standards. Moral beliefs and standards are products of automatic and controlled information-processing and decision-making mechanisms. To understand how people make moral decisions, we must understand how early evolved mechanisms in the old brain and recently evolved mechanisms in the new brain are activated and how they interact. Understanding what a sense of morality is for helps us understand what it is.     

The Clustering and Contagion of Suicide

Two general types of suicide cluster have been discussed in the literature; roughly, these can be classified as mass clusters and point clusters. Mass clusters are media related, and the evidence for them is equivocal; point clusters are local phenomena, and these do appear to occur. Contagion has not been conceptually well developed nor empirically well supported as an explanation for suicide clusters. An alternative explanation for why suicides sometimes cluster is articulated: People who are vulnerable to suicide may cluster well before the occurrence of any overt suicidal stimulus, and when they experience severe negative events, including but not limited to the suicidal behavior of one member of the cluster, all members of the cluster are at increased risk for suicidality (a risk that may be offset by good social support).     

Discerning the Behavior of the Suicide Bomber: The Role of Vengeance

Deliberate suicide used to achieve some end in group conflict is a relatively rare but always dramatic behavior. Motivation for such behavior is complex occurs usually at both the group and individual levels, and can have multiple meanings. The author examines suicide bombing as it has occurred recently in both the 9/11 event and in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, notes that it appears to be a behavior motivated mainly by the singular intent to destroy a particular people, and concludes that it is a 'depressive equivalent' behavior rooted in the desire for vengeance. He identifies such behavior, given this motivation, as a crime by the leaders of the groups planning such acts against those they send on suicide bombing missions. He exhorts civilized society to bring these criminals to justice in order to prevent such acts.     

The Executive Functions and Self-Regulation: An Evolutionary Neuropsychological Perspective

Neuropsychology Review - Neuropsychology has customarily taken a molecular and myopic view of executive functioning, concentrating largely on those proximal processes of which it may be comprised....     

The Influence of Acetaminophen and Observational Conditioning on the Acquired Capability for Suicide

The effects of acetaminophen and a reading task on physical pain tolerance and fearlessness about death were tested in 106 undergraduate students. Participants were randomized into four groups, each receiving either acetaminophen or no medication, along with either a control or experimental reading task. It was predicted that acetaminophen would increase pain tolerance and fearlessness about death, that the experimental reading task would decrease both outcomes, and that the interventions would interact (i.e., acetaminophen would dampen the effects of the reading task). Multivariate analysis of variance was used to test hypotheses. No significant interaction was found (p = .17) and there was no effect for acetaminophen (p = .56), but individuals administered the experimental reading task demonstrated significantly higher physical pain tolerance (p < .05).     

Written Exposure Therapy for Suicide in a Psychiatric Inpatient Unit: A Case Series

Patients with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) are at an elevated risk of suicide. For patients hospitalized for suicide risk, psychosocial treatment and stabilization are routinely offered; however, the availability of evidence-based, manualized therapeutic interventions for PTSD is sparse. Typically, the short duration of hospitalization makes it difficult to accommodate evidence-based, trauma-focused treatments. This article presents the clinical course of four active-duty service members with PTSD who were hospitalized in a psychiatric inpatient unit for acute suicide risk and treated with Written Exposure Therapy for Suicide (WET-S). WET-S is a brief, five-session therapy based upon Written Exposure Therapy and augmented with Crisis Response Planning for Suicide Prevention. Both posttraumatic stress symptoms and suicidal ideation were reduced from pre- to posttreatment for three of the four patients treated. WET-S shows promise as a manualized therapeutic intervention that can be delivered on an inpatient psychiatric unit.     

The Many Faces of Physician-Assisted Suicide

Physician-assisted suicide is a complex and controversial issue that touches on standards of medical practice, the balance between individual rights and the rights of the state, and our fears of death and pain. Supporters of assisted suicide propose it as an alternative to a lingering, highly technological death, and define it as the act of a physician who prescribes a lethal dose of a medication for a terminally ill patient, with the knowledge that the patient intends to commit suicide. The recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling upheld prohibitions against assisting in a suicide, but left open the possibility that in certain specific cases assisted suicide might be constitutionally protected. The Supreme Court's refusal to extend constitutional protection to assisted suicide was done in part to insure that public debate and legislative fact-finding would continue. As stated in Justice Rehnquist's majority opinion, ...Americans are engaged in an earnest and profound debate about the morality, legality and practicality of physician-assisted suicide (Washington v. Glucksberg, 96-110—Opinion, 1997, p. 26). As researchers, policy makers, and health care providers, we have an obligation to insure that political debate and empirical research are continuing and productive, and that this issue becomes more than just an occasion to play out ideological or personal differences.     

The Family of Instruments That Assess Suicide Risk

In suicide assessment, Becks Scale for Suicide Ideation is used widely, though other adult and youth instruments are available. A creative, positive instrument is the Reasons for Living. Advantages of suicide questionnaires include rapid assessment, access to information that may be difficult to obtain by observations and verbal interaction, ease of completion for some, availability of established norms for some instruments, and indirect information provided by questionnaire responding. Disadvantages are the temptation to accept responses uncritically, the possibility that therapists or clients view the questionnaires as superseding the therapeutic relationship, the implication that suicide tendencies are static, and, at times, cost. Overall, sound clinical judgment is paramount when assessing for suicide.     

The Spiritual Task of Religion in Culture: An Evolutionary Perspective

It is quite impossible to consider human nature within an evolutionary perspective if we leapfrog over culture and establish some direct relation between cosmic and human evolution without taking culture into consideration. Culture holds a significant place within the structures of nature, as the "epic" of evolution portrays nature—cosmic, physical, and biological. Religion emerges within culture, and it plays a role in organizing the human consciousness and in generating the stories, rituals, and morality that constitute the organization of consciousness. Since organization of consciousness determines how culture is conducted, and since we face a global crisis today because of the ways we are conducting our culture, religion's role is critical for the future of culture. Wherever it is attempted, whether in terms of traditional or posttraditional modes, the fashioning of adequate worldviews, rituals, and morality is an essentially religious activity. For both traditional and posttraditional modes, the task is to weave structures of meaning with the sciences of evolution so as to effect the most suitable organization of consciousness.     

Clarifying the Relationship of Dissociative Experiences to Suicide Ideation and Attempts: A Multimethod Examination in Two Samples

Fears of pain, injury, and death may represent key barriers to acting on suicidal thoughts. Dissociation, which involves a disconnection from one’s body, may reduce fears and sensations of pain associated with harming the body, in turn facilitating suicide attempts. This study examined whether dissociation differentiated individuals with a history of suicide attempts from those with a history of suicide ideation, and investigated whether other relevant constructs explain this relationship. Sample 1 included 754 undergraduates (M_age = 21, 79% female) who completed a battery of self-report measures. Sample 2 included 247 undergraduates (M_age = 19, 74% female) who completed a self-report measure of dissociation, a clinical interview regarding suicide history, and four counterbalanced behavioral pain tolerance tasks. In both samples, dissociation was elevated in lifetime attempters compared to ideators (d = 0.28; d = 0.46; ps = 0.01) and slightly elevated in lifetime ideators compared to nonsuicidal individuals (d = 0.19, p = .02; d = 0.24, p = .47), though this effect was non-significant in the latter sample. In Sample 1, dissociation no longer differentiated attempters from ideators after controlling for clinical covariates. In Sample 2, dissociation was unrelated to behavioral pain tolerance tasks, and these tasks did not account for the association between dissociation and attempts. Overall, dissociation differentiated individuals with a history of suicide attempts from those with ideation alone in both samples. Pain tolerance did not explain this association; instead, it is possible that the relationship of dissociation to suicide attempts is due to “third variables” associated with both phenomena, such as symptoms of borderline personality disorder or posttraumatic stress disorder.     

A Reanalysis of Occupation and Suicide: Negative Perceptions of the Workplace Linked to Suicide Attempts

Suicide is the ultimate outcome of poor psychological well-being; however, there is a paucity of research examining the link between occupation and suicide, despite early academic interest and the known importance of work to our everyday lives. We propose that this body of research was abandoned prematurely, and we provide a reanalysis by integrating the Job Characteristics Model and the Conservation of Resources model with extant suicide research. Specifically, we hypothesize that work design characteristics (job autonomy, task variety, physical demands) and threats to personal resources (absence of viewing work-as-career, work-family conflict, family-work conflict, job dissatisfaction) are linked to suicide attempts via depression and suicidal ideation. Utilizing three measurement occasions and 2,855 participants from the AddHealth database, our findings indicate that job autonomy, task variety, work-family conflict, family-work conflict, and job dissatisfaction all indirectly contribute to employees' suicide attempts via depression and suicidal ideation. Thus, negative employee perceptions of the workplace environment have much more severe consequences than is typically examined. Based on these results, we provide recommendations for developing a theoretically derived nomological net around suicidal behavior in an organizational context, and offer strategies for managers and employees to construct a work environment that is conducive to employee well-being.     

3 Culture and Ego-Ideal in Suicide: An Adult Case

A case is presented in which the patient's self-expectations, arising from his ego ideal, were violated by a conflict with his wife, who came from a different culture and did not share his marital and family values. When she left him he was devastated, not only by the loss of his family, but by the destruction of his ideal vision of himself as a husband and father. A dangerous suicide attempt followed. The psychodynamic formulation of the case and the treatment that followed from it are discussed.     

Family Conflict and Forgiveness Among Survivors of Suicide

This study explored the lived experiences of immediate family members who were left behind and their intra- and interpersonal struggles with other family members and their coping efforts to overcome these struggles. We used interpretative phenomenological analysis for data collection and analysis and conducted in-depth interviews with 11 participants in Korea. Two superordinate themes, with two ordinate themes in each, were identified: (a) family conflict after a family member’s suicide (“discordant grieving” and “suicide loss as a catalyst for family conflict”) and (b) forgiveness (“struggling to forgive other family members, the deceased, and themselves” and “the process and importance of forgiveness”). The implications of these findings are discussed.     

Assisted Suicide,Suffering and the Meaning of a Life

The ethical problems surrounding voluntary assisted suicide remain formidable, and are unlikely to be resolved in pluralist societies. An examination of historical attitudes to suicide suggests that modernity has inherited a formidable complex of religious and moral attitudes to suicide, whether assisted or not. Advocates usually invoke the ending of intolerable suffering as one justification for euthanasia of this kind. This does not provide an adequate justification by itself, because there are (at least theoretically) methods which would relieve suffering without causing the physical death of the suffering person. Carried to extremes, these methods would finish the life worth living, but leave a being which was technically alive. Such acts, however, would provide no moral escape, since they would create beings without meaning. Arguments seeking to justify ending the lives of others need some grounding in concepts of the meaning of a life. The euthanasia discourse therefore needs to take at least some account of the meaning we construct for our lives and the lives of others.     

中国自杀未遂的流行特征及影响因素研究

自杀是一个严重的社会问题和公共卫生问题。但目前尚未完全了解自杀的影响因素以及预防自杀的方法。流行病学研究表明自杀未遂是自杀的重要预测因素,了解自杀未遂的特征以及影响因素将有助于减少自杀行为的发生。本文对自杀未遂的流行特征以及影响因素进行了综述。     

“自杀”：一个重要的伦理问题

自杀现已成为人类死亡十大原因之一 ,而且呈现出低龄化的趋势 ,越来越引起社会的关注。因而 ,从政治、经济、社会、疾病、文化等多视角来寻找自杀的外部原因 ,对探究这个重要的伦理问题是有益的。     

新生代员工自杀意念的产生机理

新生代员工的自杀意念正在引起研究者的关注.本研究立足于职业健康心理学和积极心理学视野,汲取自我决定理论和生命意义理论的思想精髓以构建“动机-生命意义”模型,系统考察社会、组织和个体因素对自杀意念的综合影响,对揭示无精神疾患员工自杀意念产生的影响机制和心理动力机制、促进研究范式从病理取向转向积极取向具有重要的理论价值;此外,还有望开发出一套“社会-组织情境→动机→生命意义”干预方案,引导企业与政府反思其现有管理体系,帮助管理者审视其管理哲学并改善其管理行为,针对尚无自杀意念或意念处于萌芽期的员工,多层次、多途径构建员工自杀的一级防控体系和心理援助机制,促进员工与企业、社会的整体和谐发展.     

Suicide and masochism: The evolving relationship between guilt,suffering, self-attack and suicide

Masochism is a complex and intriguing phenomenon. Self-attack may serve many purposes. Some patients suffer through harsh self-criticism, bodily harm, or even tormenting thoughts of death, without actually killing themselves. Some of these patients ultimately may go on to die by suicide, but for many, the self-torturing aspect may exist independently in acute or chronic forms. This paper addresses the complex relationship between masochism and suicide as two separate yet interconnected phenomena.     

进化观点下的幸福研究

人类社会生活的一项重要目标是追求幸福(happiness), 影响幸福体验的因素有食物、财富、婚姻及友谊等。寻求幸福与避免痛苦能让人们的幸福需求得到满足。幸福和痛苦不是人类通过进化获得的一种最终机能, 然而幸福和痛苦对人类远古祖先的影响在于调节行为活动以增加生存与繁衍可能。为什么有些环境刺激比其他刺激更能让人体验幸福？为什么回避痛苦与追求幸福同样重要？为什么幸福体验有相对性、过度性与目标性的特点？这些问题可以在进化观点中得到较好回答。人们的幸福感可以在认识基因与环境关系的基础上得到加强, 如加强亲属联系、强化社会合作、重视婚姻承诺以及满足本能欲望等。     

大学生的冲动性特质与自杀意念的关系:一个有调节的中介模型

以应激-易感模型为依据考察冲动性特质与自杀意念的关系,并在此基础上提出一个有调节的中介模型,探讨负性生活事件影响的中介作用以及家庭环境的调节作用。采用巴瑞特冲动性量表、青少年生活事件量表、家庭环境量表、贝克自杀意念量表对902名大学生进行集体施测,旨在考察负性生活事件的影响对大学生冲动性特质与自杀意念的中介作用以及家庭环境的调节作用,结果表明:(1)冲动性特质和负性生活事件的影响能正向预测大学生的自杀意念;(2)负性生活事件的影响在冲动性特质和自杀意念之间起中介作用;(3)负性生活事件影响的中介作用和冲动性特质的直接作用受家庭环境的调节。这些结果对于综合解释环境与个体因素对自杀意念的作用与机制具有重要意义。