Morality's Dark Side: On the strategic application of morality Speaker: Jordan Wylie
Morality is often seen as a guiding light, but it can sometimes cast a dark shadow. In my work, I investigate the ways people use morality toward immoral ends—strategically applying the rules, their values, and their engagement. While it's commonly assumed that the “punishment fits the crime”, people sometimes exploit rules to fulfill personal punitive desires, even when they fall outside the purview of the rules. In 4 experiments (N = 1,010), using a mix of economic games, surveys, and public data from municipal calls to 311, we identified a subclass of rarely followed codified rules, which we call “phantom rules”. We find that people judge phantom rule violations to be morally inconsequential until the violator also breaks an unrelated social norm. In such cases, they suddenly warrant enforcement—unless the desire for punishment has already satiated. These findings reveal that rules are sometimes leveraged to proscribe behavior that the rules do not cover. Next, we often assume people’s moral values orient them toward minimizing the harm done to others. Yet across 5 studies (N = 1,124), including a nationally representative sample, we found that moral values can lead us astray. Specifically, we find that the more people morally oppose a behavior (e.g., gun ownership), the less they support incremental harm reducing strategies (e.g., gun safety training). That is, people prioritize their own moral opposition over reducing harm to others. Finally, moral psychology frequently assumes that people want to be good and look good to others. Yet, people often voluntarily engage with immorality—specifically immoral characters in television, literary fiction, and more. Using data from Netflix and experimental methods (N = 1,115), we find that people prefer to learn about immoral agents compared to morally good ones, especially their motives—both for famous fictional characters and novel ones too. This suggests a deep-seated curiosity about the complexities and motivations behind immoral behaviors. From the strategic application of rules to the allure of moral transgressions in media, the human moral compass does not always point toward goodness; it can sometimes lead people to embrace the darker contours of morality. |
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(Social Job Talk) Jordan Wylie - Morality's Dark Side: On the Strategic Application of Morality
