The Impact of the Moral Foundations Arguments on Early Adolescents

The empirical research reported in this article is based on the Moral Foundations Theory proposed by J. Haidt. Objectives. The author examines the impact of moral foundations arguments on early adolescents’ moral judgments regarding violating moral rules and explores gender-related differences between moral foundations preferences. Method. The effect of moral foundations arguments was measured by a newly developed meta-ethical position test (MEPT). The MEPT consists of a pretest questionnaire, treatment by moral foundations arguments, and a posttest questionnaire. The sample contained 178 early adolescents from the Czech Republic (84 females and 94 males). The influence of the moral foundations arguments was analyzed by comparing the pretest with the posttest. Results. 91% of teenagers changed their moral judgment due to confrontations with the moral foundations arguments. A Wilcoxon signed-rank test found that the moral foundations arguments were significantly relevant, since the P-value was lower than 0.001. The Mann-Whitney U test revealed the importance of the gender aspect: P-value care equals 0.01 and liberty 0.01. Girls have a preference for care foundation (21% more than boys), while boys tended to liberty (27 % more than girls). It seems that moral foundations arguments strongly change early adolescents’ moral judgments and can be practically applied as a valuable platform for early adolescents’ moral development

MRI-based Brain Healthcare Quotients: A bridge between neural and behavioral analyses for keeping the brain healthy

Neurological and psychiatric disorders are a burden on social and economic resources. Therefore, maintaining brain health and preventing these disorders are important. While the physiological functions of the brain are well studied, few studies have focused on keeping the brain healthy from a neuroscientific viewpoint. We propose a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)-based quotient for monitoring brain health, the Brain Healthcare Quotient (BHQ), which is based on the volume of gray matter (GM) and the fractional anisotropy (FA) of white matter (WM). We recruited 144 healthy adults to acquire structural neuroimaging data, including T1-weighted images and diffusion tensor images, and data associated with both physical (BMI, blood pressure, and daily time use) and social (subjective socioeconomic status, subjective well-being, post-materialism and Epicureanism) factors. We confirmed that the BHQ was sensitive to an age-related decline in GM volume and WM integrity. Further analysis revealed that the BHQ was critically affected by both physical and social factors. We believe that our BHQ is a simple yet highly sensitive, valid measure for brain health research that will bridge the needs of the scientific community and society and help us lead better lives in which we stay healthy, active, and sharp

Moral Values That Thwart Intergroup Interactions: an Investigation on the Interaction Between Indonesian Moslems and Chinese-Indonesian Christians

As one of the most established theories, the contact hypothesis has been well-researched throughout decades of investigations. However, there have been few attempts to investigate individual factors that may influence interaction processes that may lower prejudice. The present study attempts to find the individual factors that can moderate the contact – prejudice effect, that is, individual moral values. Previous researches have noted that individuals with high moral loyalty, authority, and sanctity may resist interacting with outgroups. Consequently, these individuals may possess higher prejudice. Thus, we hypothesize that individuals with higher levels of those three moral values may experience the contact effect more profoundly, in which there is stronger contact – prejudice effect. 594 Moslem participants participated in the online survey we administered. We found that moral authority and purity can moderate the contact – prejudice effect, consistent with our hypotheses. These patterns were found only for the contact – subtle prejudice effect. However, moral loyalty cannot moderate this effect. We discuss the implications by examining the Indonesian current sociopolitical conditions and how the three moral values influence the dynamics of intergroup contact

Construing a Transgression as a Moral or a Value Violation Impacts Other Versus Self-Dehumanisation

What determines whether people dehumanise another person or themselves? We propose that the construal of a violation as moral or value-based influences who is dehumanised. Previous research has demonstrated that people perceive morals to be objective indicators of right and wrong (Goodwin amp; Darley, 2008), while values are viewed as subjective (Bardi amp; Schwartz, 2003). Here, participants recalled past moral or value violations, then reflected on the thoughts and feelings of either the other person victimised by their violation, or their own thoughts and feelings. Participants then rated dehumanisation of either the other or themselves using the Human Nature and Uniqueness Scale. We found that participants dehumanised the other more when recalling a value violation. This result suggests that differences in construal between morals and values can have an impact on dehumanisation

Nonlinear associations between human values and neuroanatomy

Human values guide behavior and the smooth functioning of societies. Schwartz’s circumplex model of values predicts a sinusoidal waveform in relations between ratings of the importance of diverse human value types (e.g., achievement, benevolence) and any variables psychologically relevant to them. In this neuroimaging study, we examined these nonlinear associations between values types and brain structure. In 85 participants, we found the predicted sinusoidal relationship between ratings of values types and two measures of white matter (WM), volume and myelin volume fraction, as well as for grey matter (GM) parameters in several frontal regions. These effects reveal new functional associations for structural brain parameters and provide a novel cross-validation of Schwartz’s model. Moreover, the sinusoidal waveform test can be applied to other circumplex models in social, affective and cognitive neuroscience

Aproximación al estudio de las emociones

Esta revisión tuvo como objeto realizar una aproximación al estudio de las emociones desde una perspectiva clínica y neuropsicológica. Se llevó a cabo una búsqueda en bases de datos como ProQuest, ScienceDirect y Google Académico. Se aprecia que el estudio de las emociones permite comprender aspectos relacionados con el comportamiento, la cognición y el desarrollo humano. La llegada de las técnicas de neuro-imagen permitirá comprender con mayor precisión los procesos cerebrales que subyacen a la emoción a nivel estructural y funcional, facilitando el desarrollo de investigaciones empíricas de las emociones, la cognición social y las emociones sociales; posibilitando alternativas diferentes para evaluar e intervenir desde la psicología.Palabras clave: Emociones, cognición social, emociones sociales

Mind Over Morals: Character Morality and Viewer Need for Cognition as Predictors of Anticipated Enjoyment of a Television Show

Using affective disposition theory (ADT) as a theoretical framework, this study examined the role of need for cognition (NFC) in a potential viewer’s desire to consume media content featuring a morally ambiguous character. According to ADT, enjoyment is driven by a viewer’s moral evaluations of characters (Zillmann & Cantor, 1972). Another body of research, which examines media consumption through the lens of uses and gratifications theory, emphasizes individual differences in a viewer’s desire to enjoy and select media content (Katz, Blumler, Gurevitch, 1973). One such individual difference that has emerged as a predictor of media selection is need for cognition (NFC); defined as an individual’s desire to engage in and enjoy effortful cognitive endeavors (Cacioppo, Petty, & Kao, 1984). A great deal of previous media entertainment research has focused on either morality or individual differences, but rarely on both. This thesis sought to contribute to recent research that has begun to fill that gap. Specifically, the objective of this thesis was to investigate the effects of both the morality of a main television character and the potential viewer’s NFC, a specific individual difference, on anticipated enjoyment and selection of a fictitious television show and on affective dispositions toward the main character. The study was conducted using an experiment with a 3 (moral vs. ambiguous vs. immoral) X 2 (high NFC vs. low NFC) factorial design. Three versions of an original television plot synopses were created, each featuring a moral, morally ambiguous, or immoral main character. The show, titled Southern Justice focused on Harrison Brooks, a seasoned detective accused of murder. Brooks’ actions and the resulting outcomes were manipulated to create the three conditions (moral, morally ambiguous, and immoral). After reading the plot synopsis to which they had been randomly assigned, participants reported their anticipated enjoyment and selection of the show and to what extent they liked the main character, Brooks. Results revealed that the morality of the main character and NFC respectively had consistent effects. Specifically, the results showed that participants liked and were more likely to select a television show that focused on a moral, rather than an immoral or morally ambiguous, character. Moreover, participants with a high level of NFC were more likely to anticipate enjoying and selecting the show than were participants with low NFC, regardless of the morality of the show’s main character. However, contrary to expectations, no interaction effects between a participants’ NFC and the morality of the main character were found for any dependent variable. These results indicate the utility of NFC in predicting individual television preferences but suggest moral complexity does not influence its role. In all, this research has implications for television producers and target niche audiences. Future research should aim to further explore NFC’s role in a viewer’s media enjoyment and selection

Amygdala Volume and Social Anxiety Symptom Severity: A Mutli-method Study

Neuroimaging research has strongly influenced a biologically-based conceptualization of social anxiety, which is the fear of evaluation from others. Functional neuroimaging research has shown consistently a robust association between atypical amygdala activation and social anxiety symptoms. However, there are disparities in the small structural imaging literature on the amygdala and social anxiety. The inconsistent findings may, in part, be a function of differences across studies in the methods used to obtain amygdala volumes. Freesurfer and manual tracings are two common segmentation techniques, and the use of one over the other involves different tradeoffs. The present study directly compared amygdala volumes generated based on Freesurfer’s boundaries to those generated based on manually corrected boundaries, in neurotypical adults with varying levels of social anxiety. Also, it examined whether amygdala volume predicted social anxiety symptom severity. The Liebowitz Social Anxiety Scale – Self-Report version served as a measure of social anxiety. Participants (N = 76) were selected from three larger archival projects. They had social anxiety scores ranging from 0 - 108 (M = 54.59 ± 33.34). The results suggest Freesurfer’s boundaries consistently produced larger amygdala volumes than manually corrected boundaries. However, in neurotypical individuals with and without social anxiety, manual correction did not provide added benefit over the use of Freesurfer with regard to predicting social anxiety symptoms. The present findings strongly suggest that volumetric measurement of the amygdala is not helpful for understanding variability in social anxiety symptom severity and call into question numerous aspects of existing volumetric studies of the neural correlates of social anxiety

Moral values are associated with individual differences in regional brain volume

Moral sentiment has been hypothesized to reflect evolved adaptations to social living. If so, individual differences in moral values may relate to regional variation in brain structure. We tested this hypothesis in a sample of 70 young, healthy adults examining whether differences on two major dimensions of moral values were significantly associated with regional gray matter volume. The two clusters of moral values assessed were "individualizing" (values of harm/care and fairness) and "binding" (deference to authority, in-group loyalty, and purity/sanctity). Individualizing was positively associated with left dorsomedial pFC volume and negatively associated with bilateral precuneus volume. For binding, a significant positive association was found for bilateral subcallosal gyrus and a trend to significance for the left anterior insula volume. These findings demonstrate that variation in moral sentiment reflects individual differences in brain structure and suggest a biological basis for moral sentiment, distributed across multiple brain regions