The Influence Of Emotion And Primed Rule On Moral Judgment Under Different Priming Modes

In our daily life,we will inevitably encounter moral dilemmas.For example,whether to choose moralistic decision-making based on moral norms or to choose utilitarian decision-making based on maximization of results is always perplexing people,so what’s the factor that affects our decision-making? Some researchers proposed that moral judgment is a process where an individual gives moral value to other individuals or social events and groups according to his own emotions,moral norms and situations,in which one’s emotions play a vital role.However,priming rule as a cognitive factor also affects individuals’ moral judgment,so whether emotion directly affects moral judgment or through the cognitive process,emotion affects moral judgment directly or through the cognitive process is also one of the focuses of this study.Therefore,this study attempts to add emotional factors to explore the external induction of individual emotion,so that the past experience of the individual is automatically induced in the dilemma,and different emotions will affect the effect of the priming rules and work together on the moral dilemma.Thus affecting the moral judgment of the individual.Based on this,this study will explore the influence of moral rule initiation and personal moral dilemma on moral judgment under different emotions.The classic moral dilemma was selected as the experimental material,and experiment 1 adopted 3(emotion: Positive vs.Neutral vs.Negative)× 2(suprathreshold moral priming rule: saving lives vs.do not kill),114 subjects were randomly selected to investigate their moral judgment by video emotion,suprathreshold moral rule initiation and personal dilemma.Results:(1)the main effect of emotion was significant,and the score of individual moral judgment in negative emotions was higher than that of neutral and positive emotions,(2)the initiation of supra-threshold moral rules was significant,and the score of moral judgment in lifesaving group was significantly higher than that of non-killing group.Experiment 2adopted 3(emotion: Positive vs.Neutral vs.Negative)× 2(subliminal moral priming rule: saving lives vs.do not kill),111 subjects were randomly selected to investigate their moral judgment by video priming emotion,subliminal moral rule initiation and personal dilemma.Results:(1)the main effect of emotion was significant,and the score of individual moral judgment in negative emotion group was higher than that of neutral and positive emotion group,(2)the initiation of subliminal moral rules was significant,and the score of moral judgment in life-saving group was significantly higher than that in the prohibition group.(3)the interaction between emotional type and moral rule prime was marginal significant,and only in neutral group,the score of moral judgment in saving lives group was significantly higher than that of do not kill group.In the saving lives group,the score of the negative emotion group and neutral group were significantly higher than that of the positive emotion group,while in do not kill group,the emotional difference was not significant.The conclusions are as follows:(1)Emotional type affects individuals’ moral judgement.Individuals’ score of moral judgment in negative emotions was significantly higher than that of positive emotions,and they are more inclined to make utilitarian decisions.(2)the initiation of different moral rules affects moral judgment,either above or below the threshold,the moral judgment score of the saving lives group is significantly higher than that of the do not kill group,and the saving lives group is inclined to make utilitarian decisions,while the do not kill group inclined to make moral decisions.(3)The type of emotion affected the initiation of moral rules.In the initiation of supra-threshold moral rules,the scores of moral judgment in positive emotion and neutral group in saving lives group were significantly higher than that of do not kill group,but there was no difference between them in the negative emotion group.In the initiation of subliminal moral rules,the score of moral judgment of the life-saving group was significantly higher than that of the non-killing group only in neutral group,and there was no significant difference between scores in the positive emotion group and the negative emotion group.