Edited by: Sumitava Mukherjee, Ahmedabad University, India
Reviewed by: Nathaniel James Siebert Ashby, Technion – Israel Institute of Technology, Israel; Mirjana Djordjevic, University of Belgrade, Serbia; Wenhai Zhang, Yancheng Institute of Technology, China
This article was submitted to Cognitive Science, a section of the journal Frontiers in Psychology
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Prior research has shown that moral judgment, moral elevation, and moral identity contribute to prosocial behavior. However, how these three motivating factors interact in predicting prosocial behaviors is not yet clear. The current study proposed and examined a moderated mediation model to illustrate the specific process of how prosocial behavior is motivated by these factors. A total of 264 Chinese undergraduate and graduate students participated in the present study (140 females; age range 17–26,
Prosocial behavior, an important form of moral behavior (
In the last few decades, researchers have focused on identifying factors that motivate prosocial behavior (
Moral judgment competence is the ability to make moral judgments (i.e., based on inner moral principles) and to act according to these judgments (
Moral elevation is one of the positive moral emotions triggered by seeing someone perform a virtuous act (
Like any other moral emotion, moral elevation may conduct as the primary source of moral motivation, motivating goodness or directly holding a person back from doing something bad directly (
Moral identity is organized around a cluster of moral traits and reflects the degree to which being moral is important to the self (
Many empirical studies found moral identity to be significantly and positively correlated with prosocial actions (
However, limitations have emerged when researchers have studied only one moral motivation. For example, effects of moral judgment have been shown to vary, and any single motivation is not sufficient to explain prosocial behavior. Hence, researchers are increasingly interested in the combined effects of moral predictors. Their research revealed that moral emotions mediated the association between moral cognition and moral conduct (
Empirical studies have shown that moral judgment may guide person’s moral emotion, and subsequently, moral emotion provides the driving force leading to prosocial behavior. For example, the association between moral judgment and moral emotion was presented in motivating prosocial behavior (
Some evidence showed that moral identity moderated the process from moral cognition or moral emotion to prosocial behavior (
Numerous research demonstrated the gender differences in prosocial behaviors (
Some studies have found the gender difference in moral motivations that predict helping behaviors (
This study aimed to examine the specific roles of moral judgment, moral elevation, and moral identity within the comprehensive framework of morality. Based on the existing literature (
The moderated mediation models for total sample. ∗p < 0.05, ∗∗p < 0.01.
The sample included 282 undergraduate and graduate students (156 female; age range 17–27,
The participants’ moral judgment competence was measured using the Chinese version of Moral Judgment Test with good validity on construction and content (C-MJT,
The Chinese version of Moral Identity Scale (C-MIS) consists of internalization (reflecting the importance of possessing moral traits) and symbolization (reflecting the importance of demonstrating to others that they possessed moral traits) subscales (
We used the Chinese Version of the Moral Elevation Scale (C-MES,
A method revised from
The ethics committee of Zhejiang Normal University in China approved the protocol of this study. We also obtained a written consent from all participants, who in turn were given envelopes containing information about the measures. All materials and measures were completed anonymously in class. At the beginning of the survey, items on moral judgment and moral identity were presented, followed by 30 filler questions unrelated to morality (How many hours of sleep do you get every day? What did you have for lunch yesterday? Do you think that reading is more fun than watching television? Do you enjoy watching sport than playing?). Then, the participants completed a description task pertaining to goodness (elevation elicited through recall of morally virtuous acts). Next, the C-MES was used to measure the moral elevation of the participants. Last, all participants took part in a test of their prosocial intentions through a simulated “request for help” situation.
Before testing our predictions, we conducted descriptive and correlation analyses using SPSS 20.0 to describe the characteristics of the Chinese sample. Then, with controlling for gender (0 = male, 1 = female) (
The means, standard deviations, and Pearson’s correlation coefficients of the variables for male and female are presented in
Descriptive statistics and correlation matrix.
Male |
Female ( |
|||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 3 | |||||
(1) Moral judgment | 25.49 | 18.02 | – | 28.20 | 15.57 | – | ||||
(2) Moral identity | 26.29 | 5.24 | 0.09 | – | 29.42 | 4.23 | 0.13 | – | ||
(3) Moral elevation | 80.25 | 10.91 | 0.16** | 0.11 | – | 83.51 | 12.00 | 0.20** | 0.10 | – |
(4) Helping time | 43.72 | 19.72 | 0.27** | 0.10 | 0.22** | 45.35 | 18.37 | 0.29** | 0.18** | 0.35** |
The results in
Least squares regression results for the total sample.
Predictor variables | The first step | The second step | The third step | ||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Helping time |
Moral elevation |
Helping time |
|||||||
95% |
95% |
95% |
|||||||
X: Moral judgment (MJ) | 0.28∗∗ | 0.05 | [0.18, 0.37] | 0.18∗∗ | 0.05 | [0.09, 0.29] | 0.24∗∗ | 0.05 | [0.14, 0.34] |
Mo: Moral identity (MI) | 0.05 | 0.05 | [-0.05, 0.15] | 0.09 | 0.05 | [-0.01, 0.20] | 0.07 | 0.05 | [-0.03, 0.18] |
XMo: MJMI | 0.02 | 0.05 | [-0.07, 0.12] | 0.01 | 0.05 | [-0.09, 0.11] | 0.01 | 0.05 | [-0.10, 0.11] |
Me: Moral elevation (ME) | – | – | – | – | 0.16∗∗ | 0.05 | [0.05, 0.26] | ||
MeMo: MEMI | – | – | – | – | 0.12∗ | 0.06 | [0.01, 0.25] | ||
Adj |
0.08 | 0.05 | 0.14 | ||||||
10.04 | 4.44 | 8.68 |
As
The relationship between moral elevation and helping time for high and low levels of moral identity.
The regression analysis showed a similar mechanism in women and men, with a slight difference in effect size of moral elevation and role of moral identity. For women (see
Least squares regression results for women.
Predictor variables | The first step | The second step | The third step | ||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Helping time |
Moral elevation |
Helping time |
|||||||
X: Moral judgment (MJ) | 0.29∗∗ | 0.05 | [0.19, 0.39] | 0.20∗∗ | 0.05 | [0.10, 0.30] | 0.23∗∗ | 0.05 | [0.13, 0.33] |
Mo: Moral identity (MI) | 0.06 | 0.05 | [-0.04, 0.16] | 0.07 | 0.05 | [-0.01, 0.15] | 0.08 | 0.05 | [-0.02, 0.18] |
XMo: MJMI | 0.02 | 0.05 | [-0.07, 0.12] | 0.02 | 0.05 | [-0.08, 0.12] | 0.01 | 0.05 | [-0.10, 0.11] |
Me: Moral elevation (ME) | – | – | – | – | 0.19∗∗ | 0.05 | [0.09, 0.28] | ||
MeMo: MEMI | – | – | – | – | 0.13∗ | 0.06 | [0.02, 0.24] | ||
Adj |
0.09 | 0.06 | 0.15 | ||||||
10.35 | 4.78 | 9.24 |
The moderated mediation models for women. ∗p < 0.05, ∗∗p < 0.01.
Least squares regression results for men.
Predictor variables | The first step | The second step | The third step | ||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Helping time |
Moral elevation |
Helping time |
|||||||
X: Moral judgment (MJ) | 0.28** | 0.05 | [0.19, 0.38] | 0.16* | 0.05 | [0.04, 0.28] | 0.24** | 0.05 | [0.13, 0.35] |
Mo: Moral identity (MI) | 0.04 | 0.05 | [-0.05, 0.13] | 0.09 | 0.05 | [-0.01, 0.19] | 0.06 | 0.05 | [-0.03, 0.15] |
XMo: MJMI | 0.04 | 0.05 | [-0.06, 0.14] | 0.01 | 0.05 | [-0.09, 0.11] | 0.03 | 0.05 | [-0.07, 0.13] |
Me: Moral elevation (ME) | - | – | - | – | 0.16* | 0.05 | [0.05, 0.27] | ||
MeMo: MEMI | - | – | - | – | 0.09 | 0.06 | [-0.01, 0.19] | ||
Adj |
0.08 | 0.05 | 0.14 | ||||||
10.57 | 4.11 | 8.09 |
The moderated mediation models for men. ∗p < 0.05, ∗∗p < 0.01.
The current study examined a comprehensive model of prosocial conduct among a Chinese young adult sample by simultaneously integrating the roles of moral judgment, moral elevation, and moral identity. Consistent with hypotheses, the results showed the mechanism underlying prosocial conduct and illuminated the different roles of the three sources of moral motivation in predicting prosocial behaviors. Specifically, it was found that moral judgment motivates prosocial behavior directly as well as through moral elevation. Moral identity facilitates the process from moral judgment to prosocial behavior by interacting with moral elevation in the indirect path. Furthermore, although both women and men share similar mechanism, we found that the mediating effect of moral elevation is stronger in women than in men while moderating role of moral identity only shows in women. Our findings clearly illustrated the direct and indirect pathways of how prosocial behavior is driven by moral cognition, emotion, and identity in men and women. Thus, our findings support a comprehensive view of morality and highlight the interplay between the three sources of moral motivation.
First, moral elevation mediated the predicting of moral judgment on prosocial behavior. These results supported the assumption that moral elevation plays a role in putting moral values into action. This helped to explain the varied findings for effect of moral thoughts on moral actions (
Second, we also found moral identity moderated the mediation by interacting with moral elevation, which helps to clarify the specific role of moral identity in moral self-regulation (
Furthermore, although the proposed model was generally identical in both males and females, gender differences were subtly presented on the effect size of moral elevation and the role of moral identity. The mediating effect accounts for more of total effect in women (13.3%) than in men (9.3%). This means a relatively weaker proportion of moral judgment’s direct effect in total motivating effect among women than men, although there was no obvious difference on absolute size of the direct effect between them. This finding supported the assumption that women often offer help for being evoked with moral emotions, while men often help others because of their moral judgment (
The limitations of the present study should be addressed here. Firstly, moral elevation was evoked by having participants recall a virtue in their minds; this method is more abstract than one that involves showing actual videos of goodness, which may induce moral emotion through audio and visual stimuli. Hence, future research should focus on developing new video material to evoke moral elevation effectively. Secondly, self-assessment of moral elevation is limited in its ability to show the duration and dynamic feelings of emotion. In view of this, the development and use of physiological or brain imaging techniques is encouraged in future research to record the dynamics of elevation feelings. Thirdly, not having considered participants’ other characteristics (e.g., age, grade, or academic type) except for gender, we didn’t get a strict-enough gender match for the subjects. Future research with a stricter gender match should be conducted to examine the compared the mechanism underlying prosocial behavior. Lastly, the generalizability of the findings may be challenged because all participants were recruited from China. The eastern and western cultural differences pertaining to this proposed model need to be examined in future studies.
In summary, our moderated mediation model examined the specific roles of moral judgment, moral elevation, and moral identity within the comprehensive framework of morality. Moral elevation mediated the predicting of moral judgment on prosocial behaviors, and moral identity moderated this mediation within the moral self-regulation system. Furthermore, although both women and men share similar mechanisms, women often offer help for being evoked with moral emotions, while men often help others because of their moral judgment. From an applied perspective, the present findings imply methods to increase prosocial behaviors. On the one hand, practical efforts should concentrate on arousing moral emotions in individuals when moral judgment is sufficiently mature. Moreover, works on promoting individuals’ moral identity should encouraged to facilitate the effect of moral emotions on moral actions. On the other hand, the approaches to enhance prosocial behaviors differ by genders. If possible, more attentions could be paid to developing men’s moral reasoning, and evoking women’s moral emotion and moral traits to enhance their prosocial behaviors, respectively.
BS, XW, WD, and WL conceived and designed the experiments. XW and WD performed the experiments. WD and YS analyzed the data. WD, YS, and RX contributed to the writing of the manuscript.
The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.