Aversive for Me, Wrong for You: First-person Behavioral Aversions Underlie the Moral Condemnation of Harm

Many studies attest to the critical role of affect in the condemnation of harmful actions, but few attempt to identify the precise representations underlying this affective response. We propose a distinction between two potential sources of affect: an aversion to the negative outcomes of an action versus an aversion grounded in the action itself. Whereas previous models have focused on outcomeoriented processes (e.g. empathy and victim perspective-taking), we argue that moral judgment is also strongly influenced by action-based aversions. Specifically, we propose that individuals engage in a process of ‘evaluative simulation’ when judging others, imagining how much it would bother them to perform the same action. Furthermore, we present evidence that this aversion can be based in superficial sensory or motor properties of the action. We consider how such ‘action aversions’ might be acquired, and we highlight important areas for future research. Emotion animates our moral lives. Compassion inspires sacrifice, rage incites reckless violence, guilt cries for forgiveness, and shame can compel destructive self-harm. Thus, our understanding of these behaviors cannot be complete without an intimate knowledge of their affective basis. Just as with moral behavior, research indicates a key causal role for emotion in moral judgment, the process of determining which behaviors are right or wrong in the first place (Greene, 2008; Greene & Haidt, 2002; Haidt, 2001). Understanding the precise affective contributions to moral judgment is therefore equally important and yet, in some respects, surprisingly underdeveloped. Which specific emotions contribute, how are they triggered, and how do they influence judgment processes? We explore these questions in the context of one particular subset of morally relevant behaviors: harmful actions. We propose a distinction between two basic sources of affect: the undesirable outcomes of a harmful action and features of the action itself. To get a sense for this distinction, consider the aversion you would feel toward punching your own mother in the face. On the one hand, it might depend on a representation of its negative outcomes, such as your mother’s pain; we call this outcome aversion. Models of moral judgment that emphasize the importance of empathy – i.e. concern for the victim of a transgression – depend on the concept of outcome-based aversion (e.g. Eslinger et al., 2002; Hoffman, 1987; Pizarro, 2000). A second potential source of affect, one perhaps less obvious, is the action itself. For instance, the mere thought of intentionally swinging your fist at your mother might elicit an aversive response without requiring you to consider the harm that it causes; we call this action aversion. Our aim is to understand whether action aversion exists, how it is acquired, and the scope of its influence on moral judgment and behavior.