How social relationships shape moral wrongness judgments

This research investigates how social relationships influence moral wrongness judgments. Two pre-registered studies (423 and 1320 US participants, respectively) examined cooperative expectations and moral wrongness judgments within various relationships (romantic partners, housemates, siblings, etc.). Study 1 established normative expectations for different relationships in terms of cooperative functions (care, hierarchy, reciprocity, mating). Study 2 demonstrated that these relationship-specific expectations accurately predicted perceived moral wrongness of actions within those relationships, outperforming models based on genetic relatedness, social closeness, or interdependence. The findings highlight the importance of relational context in moral judgment.

Brian D. Earp, Killian L. McLoughlin, Joshua T. Monrad, Margaret S. Clark, Molly J. Crockett