Being good to look good: Self-reported moral character predicts moral double standards among reputation-seeking individuals

Moral character is widely expected to lead to moral judgements and practices. However, such expectations are often breached, especially when moral character is measured by self-report. We propose that because self-reported moral character partly reflects a desire to appear good, people who self-report a strong moral character will show moral harshness towards others and downplay their own transgressions—that is, they will show greater moral hypocrisy. This self-other discrepancy in moral judgements should be pronounced among individuals who are particularly motivated by reputation. Employing diverse methods including large-scale multination panel data (N = 34,323), and vignette and behavioural experiments (N = 700), four studies supported our proposition, showing that various indicators of moral character (Benevolence and Universalism values, justice sensitivity, and moral identity) predicted harsher judgements of others' more than own transgressions. Moreover, these double standards emerged particularly among individuals possessing strong reputation management motives. The findings highlight how reputational concerns moderate the link between moral character and moral judgement.     

Procedural justice and the hedonic principle: how approach versus avoidance motivation influences the psychology of voice

The authors investigate the relation between the hedonic principle (people's motivations to approach pleasure and to avoid pain) and procedural justice. They explore whether approach or avoidance motivation increases the effect that people feel they were treated more fairly following procedures that do versus do not allow them an opportunity to voice their opinion. Experiments 1 and 2 reveal that these procedures influence procedural justice judgments more strongly when people conduct approach motor action (arm flexion) than when they conduct avoidance motor action (arm extension). Experiment 3 indicates that individual-difference measures of participants' approach motivations predicted procedural justice judgments following voice versus no-voice procedures. The authors conclude that people's motivational orientations stimulate their fairness-based reactions to voice procedures.     

Retributive reactions to suspected offenders: the importance of social categorizations and guilt probability

In the current research, the author investigates the influence of social categorizations on retributive emotions (e.g., anger) and punishment intentions when people evaluate suspected offenders as independent observers. It is argued that information that guilt is certain or uncertain (i.e., guilt probability) has different consequences for retributive reactions to ingroup and outgroup suspects. In correspondence with predictions, results of four experiments showed that people reacted more negatively to ingroup than outgroup suspects when guilt was certain but that people reacted more negatively to outgroup than ingroup suspects when guilt was uncertain. It is concluded that guilt probability moderates the influence of social categorizations on people's retributive reactions to suspected offenders.     

Is the label ‘conspiracy theory’ a cause or a consequence of disbelief in alternative narratives?

Using the label ‘conspiracy theory’ is widely perceived to be a way of discrediting wild ideas and unsubstantiated claims. However, prior research suggests that labelling statements as conspiracy theories does not reduce people's belief in them. In four studies, we probed this effect further, and tested the alternative hypothesis that the label ‘conspiracy theory’ is a consequence rather than a cause of (dis)belief in conspiracy-related statements. Replicating prior research, Study 1 (N = 170) yielded no evidence that the label ‘conspiracy theory’ affects belief in statements. In Study 2 (N = 199), we discovered that the less people believed in statements, the more they favoured labelling them as ‘conspiracy theories’. In Studies 3 and 4 (Ns = 150 and 151), we manipulated the relative believability of statements and found that participants preferred the label ‘conspiracy theory’ for relatively less believable versus more believable statements. The current research therefore supports the hypothesis that prior (dis)agreement with a statement affects the use of the label ‘conspiracy theory’ more than the other way around.     

Coercive Interference and Moral Judgment

Coercion is by its very nature hostile to the individual subjected to it. At the same time, it often is a necessary evil: political life cannot function without at least some instances of coercion. Hence, it is not surprising that coercion has been the topic of heated philosophical debate for many decades. Though numerous accounts have been put forth in the literature, relatively little attention has been paid to the question what exactly being subjected to coercion does to an individual that makes it so hostile to his person. This paper develops an analysis of the subjective aspect of coercion whereby this hostility is explained. It is argued that coercion is not just a matter of interference with one’s agency, but also affects one’s morality. Because coercion is a form of subjugation it does more than merely limit one’s freedom, it constitutes an affront to one’s dignity as well. A new account of coercion is developed that pays particular attention to the subjectivity inherent in coercion. This account takes a middle ground in the ongoing debate between advocates of moralised and non-moralised conceptualisations of coercion. The paper closes by applying this account to two prominent issues in the literature on coercion: the use of coercion claims in attempts to avoid being held responsible for one’s actions, and the coerciveness of the law.     

Be aware to care: Public self-awareness leads to a reversal of the bystander effect

The classic bystander effect stipulates that people help others more when they are alone than when other bystanders are present. We reason that, sometimes, the presence of bystanders can increase helping, notably in situations where public self-awareness is increased through the use of accountability cues (e.g., a camera). We conducted two experiments in which we tested this line of reasoning. In both experiments, participants read messages soliciting support in an online forum. We varied the number of people that were present in that forum to create a bystander and an alone condition. In Study 1, we introduced an accountability cue by making participants' screen-names more salient, and in Study 2, we used a webcam. Both studies indicate that, as expected, the bystander effect can be reversed by means of cues that raise public self-awareness in social settings.     

Conditioning and Interpretation Shifts

This paper develops a probabilistic model of belief change under interpretation shifts, in the context of a problem case from dynamic epistemic logic. Van Benthem [4] has shown that a particular kind of belief change, typical for dynamic epistemic logic, cannot be modelled by standard Bayesian conditioning. I argue that the problems described by van Benthem come about because the belief change alters the semantics in which the change is supposed to be modelled: the new information induces a shift in the interpretation of the sentences. In this paper I show that interpretation shifts can be modeled in terms of updating by conditioning. The model derives from the knowledge structures developed by Fagin et?al [8], and hinges on a distinction between the propositional and informational content of sentences. Finally, I show that Dempster-Shafer theory provides the appropriate probability kinematics for the model.