Complex animal societies are most successful if members minimise harms caused to one another and if collaboration occurs. In order to promote this, a moral structure inevitably develops. Hence morality has evolved in humans and in many other species. The attitudes which people have towards other humans and individuals of other species are greatly affected by this biologically–based morality. Th...

Evolutionary theories of morality, beginning with Darwin, have focused on explanations for altruism. More generally, these accounts have concentrated on conscience (self-regulatory mechanisms) to the neglect of condemnation (mechanisms for punishing others). As a result, few theoretical tools are available for understanding the rapidly accumulating data surrounding third-party judgment and puni...

Abstract: This paper uses the example of Slow Food International (SFI) and its promotion of artisanal cheese to examine how scale is produced around the defense of particular social relations of production. I argue that attempts by SFI to naturalize discursive configurations of rural/local/traditional express a particular politics tied to the anxiety of ‘losing’ imagined rural communities. Howe...

The research investigated perceivers' inferences about the morality of target persons who engaged in aggressive behavior. Across several experiments, inferences about the morality of an aggressor were based more on the perceived motives of the target than on the presence of facilitating situational forces. For example, when a target's aggression was facilitated by personal rewards for aggressio...

Examined the role of emotion-based moral processes in the committing of delinquent acts by adolescent males with conduct disorder (CD). An Affective Morality Index (AMI) was developed to assess emotional responses to vignettes of delinquent acts. CD groups, as compared to a non-CD group, reported lower levels of guilt and fear and higher levels of excitement and happiness following described tr...

Three studies examined strategies of status improvement in experimentally created (Study 1 and 2) and preexisting (Study 3) low-status groups. Theory and prior research suggested that an in-group norm that established a particular strategy of status improvement as moral (rather than competent) would have a greater effect on individuals' decision to work at this strategy. Both Study 1 and Study ...

The central question of Churchland’s book Braintrust is where do moral values come from? She answers it in terms of the latest research in neuroscience, evolutionary biology, experimental psychology, and genetics. By explaining and understanding our social practices via scientific research Churchland tries to provide a neurobiological platform for morality and thus illuminates the usually negle...

This paper examines how charitable giving offers an example of lay morality, reflecting people's capacity for fellow-feeling, moral sentiments, personal reflexivity, ethical dispositions, moral norms and moral discourses. Lay morality refers to how people should treat others and be treated by them, matters that are important for their subjective and objective well-being. It is a first person ev...