Reina Takamatsu

Moral circles represent the figurative boundaries that distinguish the human and non-human entities that are considered to have moral worth from the entities that are considered to lack moral worth. The extent to which individuals have wide-reaching boundaries is referred to as moral expansiveness. Investigations into the psychological processes that underlie moral circle decision-making and moral expansiveness are only just beginning. Through two studies, we investigated the mediating role of moral emotions as a potential mechanism linking individual differences in moral expansiveness with pro-environmental outcomes. In Study 1, anger mediated the link between moral expansiveness and pro-environmental behavioural intentions. We replicated and extended this finding in Study 2 using two culturally distinct samples (the United States and Japan). Unlike anger, the mediating effect of disgust depended on the culture and specific form of moral judgment. The mediating effect of disgust was significant only in the United States and in relation to pro-environmental and prosocial decision-making for in-groups. Together, these findings provide some of the first evidence of the psychological mechanisms linking moral expansiveness to subsequent pro-environmental decision-making and highlight anger as a crucial emotional component.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the role of perceived vulnerability to disease, emotions (disgust, anger), and perceived norms in predicting moral judgments of anti-COVID-19-preventive behaviors in US and Japan. A total of 442 Japanese and 365 American participants completed an online survey. Disgust and anger mediated the link between perceived vulnerability to disease (germ aversion) and moral judgments of preventive behaviors across both cultures. Perceived social norms among friends and family were associated with harsh judgments of anti-preventive behaviors for Japanese but not for American participants. Overall, our results suggest that effective strategies for promoting preventive behaviors may be culturally valid if they focus on the fear for infectious disease and related aversive affect. We also discussed the possibility that some strategies could be characteristic of collectivistic cultures, warranting further cross-cultural comparisons.

Drawing from research on moral judgment and affective dysfunction, we examined how trait psychopathy and alexithymia, which are characterized as empathic deficits, relate to utilitarian moral judgments in sacrificial dilemmas. As predicted, primary and secondary psychopathy traits and alexithymia were associated with reduced empathic concern. However, primary psychopathy and difficulty identifying feelings (one of three alexithymia traits), but not secondary psychopathy and other two alexithymia traits, were associated with utilitarian judgments. Moreover, hierarchical regression analysis showed that primary psychopathy, difficulty identifying feelings, and empathic concern made unique contributions to the prediction of direct harm on the victim, whereas alexithymia traits made weaker contributions. Although the lack of affective empathy is found in psychopathy and alexithymia, the process through which the two traits lead to utilitarian judgment in sacrificial dilemmas may be distinct. The present findings add to the growing literature, contributing to a fuller picture of the relationship between empathy, trait psychopathy, and alexithymia.