1. Robert Nutt, Michael J. Bernstein, & Jacob A. Benfield
Emotional Intelligence and its Effects on Moral Reasoning
Robert Nutt, Michael J. Bernstein, & Jacob A. Benfield
Penn State University Abington
Introduction
Numerous studies over the past decade have been preformed to examine the influences on human moral reasoning in the brain and why such reasoning occurs.
One such study by Greene et al. (2001) indicated that specific regions of the brain activate during this moral reasoning state, which is where people are put into a situation where there is some sort of moral dilemma.
One specific way to measure moral reasoning is through the Trait Meta Mood Scale (TMMS) developed by Peter Salovey. This scale focuses on the idea of Emotional Intelligence (EI). EI has three specific subscales; Repair, Attention, and Clarity. Positive correlations were found between EI levels and levels of depression, self-consciousness, and optimism. (Salovey et al, 1985).
Many different factors come into play when people choose an appropriate moral reaction to situations. This can be seen in Salovey’s original development of the TMMS where the EI levels changed based on the degree of stress levels of a situation. (Salovey et al, 1985)
Other findings showed that people tend to base their moral reasoning heavily by weighing out the essential pros/cons of the given situation with however much time they have. This follows the principle of the double effect, which states that someone in a morally questionable situation will base their choice through certain factors like if the act they are about to commit is considered good, if the good caused by the act outweighs the bad, and finally if the person has the full intent to commit the good act and not the bad act.
This study aims to examine whether there is a correlation between where the Repair, Attention, or Clarity subscales of the TMMS indicate whether participants will either push or not push the victim in the classic trolley dilemma.
Hypothesis
It was predicted that there would be a correlation between any subscales of the TMMS and whether or not participants would push or not push the victim in the given scenario. It was also predicted that the subscales would differ in significance towards what the participant chose to do.
Methods
Participants
121 participants were gathered for this study. Participants were gathered through web- recruitment using an online survey created via the Penn State Qualtrics program. Gender broke down into 70 women and 51 men for this study, with the average age at (SD=11.79). The study ran for around two weeks to collect the data.
Materials
The entirety of the Trait Meta Mood Scale (48 items) was used as the primary scale for this study.
Two forms of a moral dilemma scenario were given, taking from the classic runaway trolley scenario. The exact questions are as followed.
Moral Dilemma 1: “A runaway trolley is headed for five people who will be killed if it proceeds on its present course. The only way to save them is to hit a switch that will turn on the trolley onto a alternate set of tracks where it will kill one person instead of five. Ought you to turn the trolley in order to save five people at the expense of one?”
Moral Dilemma 2: “You are standing next a large stranger on a foot-bridge that spans the tracks, in between the oncoming trolley and the five people. In this scenario, the only way to save the five people is to push this stranger off the bridge. He will die if you do this, but his body will stop the trolley from reaching the others. Ought you to save the five others by pushing this stranger?”
Procedure
Participants were tasked with two forms of questions. The first question set consisting of the entirety of the Trait Meta Mood Scale and the second set consisting of the trolley dilemma scenario in its original form.
There were a total of 48 items on the TMMS, each being asked to answer on a scale from 1 to 5. 1 being a “strongly disagree”, and 5 being a “strongly agree”.
The trolley dilemma given to the participants were answered simply by a “yes” or “no” choice for both situations given.
Results
We conducted a series of separate independent sample t-tests to see whether people who made a decision to pull the lever in Moral Dilemma Scenario 1 and then people who decided to push the person in Moral Dilemma Scenario 2 differed on the three subscales of Emotional intelligence (Attention, Clarity, Repair).
When comparing the participants EI level differences in Moral Dilemma Scenario 1, we found no differences in any of the subscale levels. (all ps>.12)
In the second scenario however, there were differences in all three of the EI subscale levels based on whether the participant decided to push or not push. The results are shown below.
For Attention to Emotions, those who would not push the person (M=3.62, SD=.46) had higher EI than those who would push the person (M=3.35, SD=.48); t(119)=3.05, p=.003.
For Clarity of Emotions, those who would not push the person (M=3.60, SD=.53) had higher EI than those who would push the person (M=3.36, SD=.54); t(119)=2.44, p=.016.
For Mood Repair, those who would not push the person (M=3.51, SD=.63) had higher EI than those who would push the person (M=3.23, SD=.58); t(119)=2.50, p=.014.
Conclusions
Significant findings were uncovered through this study:
All three subscales of the TMMS had an affect on whether or not the participant would push or not push in the moral dilemma scenario 2.
Participants were more likely to not push the individual
The participants that chose not to push the individual had higher EI levels than the participants who chose to push.
The subscale of repair had significantly less affect on moral reasoning compared to the other two subscales.
Things to be considered towards possible future studies:
A better in-depth study could show why these three subscale variables specifically affect an individual’s moral processing
Other factors were most likely involved that could be added to this study. Things like empathy come to mind when considering moral crisis's, so a future study which adds better control or manipulation for/against the empathy variable could produce more significant results.
Web-based surveys are often not the most reputable source of testing. Participants could have quickly scrambled through most of the test in order to finish it faster instead of answering honestly and truthfully. More manipulation checks should be added to prevent this from happening.
References
Salovey, P., Mayer, J. D., Goldman, S. L., Turvey, C., & Palfai, T. P. (1995). Emotional attention, clarity, and repair: Exploring emotional intelligence using the Trait Meta-Mood Scale. Emotion, disclosure, and health, 125, 154.
Lind, G., & Wakenhut, R. (1985). Testing for moral judgment competence. Moral development and the social environment. Studies in the philosophy and psychology of moral judgment and education,
Greene, J. D., Sommerville, R. B., Nystrom, L. E., Darley, J. M., & Cohen, J. D. (2001). An fMRI investigation of emotional engagement in moral judgment. Science, 293(5537),
Greene, J. D., Nystrom, L. E., Engell, A. D., Darley, J. M., & Cohen, J. D. (2004). The neural bases of cognitive conflict and control in moral judgment. Neuron, 44(2),
Hauser, M., Cushman, F., Young, L., Kang‐Xing Jin, R., & Mikhail, J. (2007). A dissociation between moral judgments and justifications. Mind & language, 22(1), 1-21.