Moral standards in decision making: Self-other bias in support of public policy

James Cornwell, David Krantz

The purpose of this theoretical paper is to help establish a new paradigm through which to view moral standards. Rather than looking at standards as purely “subtractive” in decision-making—that is, rather than seeing them as reducing the possible choices a person can make by either inhibiting behaviors or requiring them—we propose to look at standards as goals in and of themselves that can suggest new patterns of behavioral activation or inhibition, in addition to constraints. In the paper we summarize a number of theoretical problems solved by looking at morality in this way, and a number of other potential practical benefits of doing so as well. The paper summarizes theoretical advances in philosophy, sociology, and decision science, and integrates moral standards into a model of human decision-making. The paper also demonstrates the usefulness of this model in explaining real-world research showing behaviors that are “irrational” according to simple economic utility models of decision-making.

Major Findings

• It is clear that moral standards impact human decision-making across a variety of contexts.  Our paper aims to clarify how these standards are integrated into a model of decision-making. The paper summarizes theoretical advances in philosophy, sociology, and decision science, and integrates moral standards into a model of human decision-making.
• The paper also demonstrates the usefulness of this model in explaining real-world research showing behaviors that are “irrational” according to simple economic utility models of decision-making.

Broader Impacts

• Understanding how moral standards are integrated into decision-making could lead us to better structure our institutions so that ethical goals are held to be paramount.

CRED2 Award (2010-2015): Funding was provided under the cooperative agreement NSF SES-0951516 awarded to the Center for Research on Environmental Decisions.