PREDICTING ATTITUDES USING MORAL FOUNDATIONS THEORYCiara K. Kidder*, Katherine R. G. White, & Stephen L. Crites, Jr.

University of Texas at El Paso

METHOD

Participants: 302 undergraduates (211 Female), Mean Age = 20.17 (SD = 3.99), 86.8% Hispanic

Measures and Procedure: Issue related measures toward 4 issues: making gay marriage legal, making abortion illegal, using torture in interrogations, using animals in medical research.

• Attitude: 9-item measure of attitude. Measured on a 1-7 scale; higher numbers indicating a more positive attitude.

• Issue relatedness: 10-item measure measuring extent to which participants view an issue as being related to each of the moral foundations. Measured on a 1-7 scale; higher numbers indicating greater relatedness.

Individual difference measures were completed after the issue relatedness measures.• Moral foundations questionnaire: 30-item measure of

participant’s reliance on the five moral foundations; 6/foundation. Measured on a 1-7 scale; higher numbers indicating greater reliance

RESULTS

Replication of Koleva et al.: • Replicated regressions used by Koleva et al. (2012):

• Block 1: age, gender, religious attendance, and political ideology

• Block 2: MFQ scores (reliance on the moral foundations)

• Block 2: Four foundations were predictors• Harm- Neg. attitudes toward Torture and Animal

Research• Loyalty- Pos. attitudes toward Gay Marriage• Authority- Pos. attitudes toward Torture and Animal

Research• Purity- Neg. attitudes toward Gay Marriage, Torture, &

Animal Research, Pos. attitudes toward Abortion (illegal)

Extension - Adding Issue Relatedness: •Block 3: Issue-relatedness scores = significant ΔR2 • Some MFQ predictors dropped out• IR foundation predictors not seen in MFQ

• Fairness = Pos. attitudes toward Gay Marriage• Harm = Pos. attitudes toward Abortion (illegal)• Loyalty = Pos. attitudes toward Torture

INTRODUCTION

Moral Attitudes• Morality: a belief system or ideology characterized by

strong conviction; varies across individuals and cultures. • Moral attitudes: distinct set of attitudes connected to our

morals. • Differ from non-moral attitudes [1]: • Resistant to change and influences of authority• Preference for greater physical and social distance from

dissimilar others• Less cooperation and conflict resolution in group settings

Moral Foundations Theory (MFT)• Moral domain is composed of five stable foundations[2]:• Harm/Care• Fairness/Reciprocity• In-group/Loyalty• Authority/Respect• Purity/Sanctity

• Extent to which we rely on them influence attitude [3]: • ↑ disapproval Animal Research = ↑ reliance on Harm• ↑ disapproval Same-sex Marriage = ↑ reliance on Purity

Issue Relatedness• Attitudes are bases on multiple types of information [4]. • Some issues may be related to multiple foundations. • Person 1: High reliance on fairness & Gay marriage is

related to fairness Reliance predicts attitude• Person 2: High reliance on fairness but Gay marriage is

not related to fairness Reliance does not predict attitude

Current StudyThe goal of the current study is to replicate previous

research [3] and examine how issue relatedness predicts attitude.

HYPOTHESES

Hypothesis 1: Replicate Koleva et al. (2012); moral foundations will predict attitudes

Hypothesis 2: Extend by adding issue relatedness; issue relatedness will also predict attitudes

Poster presented at the 14th Annual Meeting of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology. *Author contact: ckconnally@miners.utep.edu

TABLE 1. BLOCK 3 OF REGRESSIONS

REFERENCES

1.Skitka, L.J. (2010) The psychology of moral conviction. Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 4(4), 267-281. doi: 10.111/j.1751-9004.2010.00254.x2.Haidt, J. & Graham, J. (2007). When morality opposes justice: Conservatives have moral intuitions that liberals may not recognize. Social Justice Research, 20(1), 98-116. doi: 10.1007/s11211-007-0034-z3.Koleva, S.P., Graham, J., Iyer, R., Ditto, P.H., Haidt, J. (2012). Tracing the threads: How five moral concerns (especially purity) help explain culture war attitudes. Journal of Research in Personality, 46(2), 184-194. doi: 10.1016/j.jrp.2012.01.0064.Crites, S.L., & Aikman, S.N. (2005). Impact of nutrition knowledge on food evaluations. European Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 59, 1191-1200. doi: 10.1038/sj.ejcn.1602331

*X indicates that the MFQ predictor from block 2 did not remain significant

DISCUSSION

Replication of Koleva et al.: •Partially replicate•7/9 of the MFQ predictors match previous [3]•Some predictors from previous did not replicate

•Methodological differences:•Attitude measure•Sample size and characteristics

Extension - Adding Issue Relatedness: •Some aspects of moral attitude is captured by IR when not captured by MFQ•e.g., Torture related to harm (MFQ) to person and loyalty (IR) to group/country

Future Directions: •Further exploration of relationship between MFQ and IR•Model relationship between MFQ, IR, and attitude