GLM-5.3, pass 7 of 10

One of the two foundations Moral Foundations Theory calls “individualizing”, which “center around protection of individuals from harm and unfair treatment”. The other was Fairness, which the MFQ-2 splits into Equality and Proportionality.

In the paper’s national samples, people who scored higher on Care placed themselves somewhat further left, and were slightly less religious, with the other five foundations held constant.

In the paper’s online panel, whose members also took 18 other questionnaires, people who scored higher on Care reported more empathic concern (r = .63), gave more weight to benevolence (.50) and to social justice and equality (.51) as values, and had fewer psychopathic traits (−.30).

Source: Atari, Haidt, Graham, Koleva, Stevens & Dehghani (2023), “Morality beyond the WEIRD”, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 125(5): the definition is the paper’s Table 2; the findings are from its national samples (the paper’s Study 2), 3,902 adults in 19 countries, who answered the same left-right question as the figure above, and its online panel (Study 3, Table 9), 1,410 adults, 82% of them American, who also took 18 other questionnaires. Study 3’s are correlations, from −1 to 1: 0 is no relationship, and a minus sign means one score falls as the other rises.

One of the two foundations the MFQ-2 makes of the older questionnaire’s Fairness. The authors define it “in terms of a motive for balanced reciprocity, equal treatment, equal say, and equal outcome.”

Of the six, it had the strongest link to placing oneself on the left. The link was not a straight line, though: people at both ends of the scale scored higher on Equality than those in between. In the authors’ words, “liberals tend to value Equality while conservatives tend to prioritize Proportionality.”

In the paper’s online panel, whose members also took 18 other questionnaires, people who scored higher on Equality supported redistributing wealth more (r = .56), were a little less inclined to want some groups above others (−.18), and scored higher on left-wing authoritarianism (.58). It was almost unrelated to Proportionality there (.02): in the paper’s words, the two “tend to be more orthogonal” in more WEIRD populations.

Source: Atari, Haidt, Graham, Koleva, Stevens & Dehghani (2023), “Morality beyond the WEIRD”, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 125(5): the definition is the paper’s Table 2; the findings are from its national samples (the paper’s Study 2), 3,902 adults in 19 countries, who answered the same left-right question as the figure above, and its online panel (Study 3, Table 9), 1,410 adults, 82% of them American, who also took 18 other questionnaires. Study 3’s are correlations, from −1 to 1: 0 is no relationship, and a minus sign means one score falls as the other rises.

The other foundation the MFQ-2 makes of the older questionnaire’s Fairness. The authors describe it as “concerned with rewards and punishments to be proportionate to merit and deservingness, and benefits to be calibrated to the amount of contribution.”

In the paper’s national samples, higher Proportionality went with placing oneself further right, though the paper describes the relationship as “inverse-U-shaped” rather than a straight line. It was also the foundation most strongly linked to being less religious.

In the paper’s online panel, whose members also took 18 other questionnaires, people who scored higher on Proportionality preferred distributing things by merit (r = .50), believed more that the world is just (.29), and gave more weight to success as a value (.22).

Source: Atari, Haidt, Graham, Koleva, Stevens & Dehghani (2023), “Morality beyond the WEIRD”, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 125(5): the definition is the paper’s Table 2; the findings are from its national samples (the paper’s Study 2), 3,902 adults in 19 countries, who answered the same left-right question as the figure above, and its online panel (Study 3, Table 9), 1,410 adults, 82% of them American, who also took 18 other questionnaires. Study 3’s are correlations, from −1 to 1: 0 is no relationship, and a minus sign means one score falls as the other rises.

One of the three foundations Moral Foundations Theory calls “binding”, which “are focused on preservation of group cohesion, maintaining boundaries for self and group, and binding individuals into larger groups and institutions.”

In the paper’s national samples, higher Loyalty went with placing oneself further right, and with being more religious, though both links were weaker than for Authority.

In the paper’s online panel, whose members also took 18 other questionnaires, people who scored higher on Loyalty described themselves as more loyal to their groups (r = .78), were more collectivist (.59), and gave more weight to loyalty and national and family security as values (.50).

Source: Atari, Haidt, Graham, Koleva, Stevens & Dehghani (2023), “Morality beyond the WEIRD”, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 125(5): the definition is the paper’s Table 2; the findings are from its national samples (the paper’s Study 2), 3,902 adults in 19 countries, who answered the same left-right question as the figure above, and its online panel (Study 3, Table 9), 1,410 adults, 82% of them American, who also took 18 other questionnaires. Study 3’s are correlations, from −1 to 1: 0 is no relationship, and a minus sign means one score falls as the other rises.

One of the three foundations Moral Foundations Theory calls “binding”, which “are focused on preservation of group cohesion, maintaining boundaries for self and group, and binding individuals into larger groups and institutions.”

Of the six, it had the strongest link to placing oneself on the right. Higher Authority also went with being more religious.

In the paper’s online panel, whose members also took 18 other questionnaires, people who scored higher on Authority gave more weight to tradition, obedience and respect as values (r = .76) and scored higher on right-wing authoritarianism (.69). The authors expected them to score lower on left-wing authoritarianism too, and they did not (.06): the one prediction of eighteen that failed.

Source: Atari, Haidt, Graham, Koleva, Stevens & Dehghani (2023), “Morality beyond the WEIRD”, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 125(5): the definition is the paper’s Table 2; the findings are from its national samples (the paper’s Study 2), 3,902 adults in 19 countries, who answered the same left-right question as the figure above, and its online panel (Study 3, Table 9), 1,410 adults, 82% of them American, who also took 18 other questionnaires. Study 3’s are correlations, from −1 to 1: 0 is no relationship, and a minus sign means one score falls as the other rises.

One of the three foundations Moral Foundations Theory calls “binding”, which “are focused on preservation of group cohesion, maintaining boundaries for self and group, and binding individuals into larger groups and institutions.”

Of the six, it was the most strongly linked to religiosity, and the most strongly related to a population’s cultural distance from the United States: people in less WEIRD (Western, educated, industrialized, rich and democratic) populations endorsed it substantially more. Its link to placing oneself on the right was the weakest of the three binding foundations.

It is also the one foundation whose scores the authors caution against comparing between countries, because its items did not work the same way in every country; the item about treating the body “like a temple” least of all.

In the paper’s online panel, whose members also took 18 other questionnaires, people who scored higher on Purity were more religious (r = .72), gave more weight to cleanliness, devoutness and self-discipline as values (.72), and were more easily disgusted (.40).

Source: Atari, Haidt, Graham, Koleva, Stevens & Dehghani (2023), “Morality beyond the WEIRD”, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 125(5): the definition is the paper’s Table 2; the findings are from its national samples (the paper’s Study 2), 3,902 adults in 19 countries, who answered the same left-right question as the figure above, and its online panel (Study 3, Table 9), 1,410 adults, 82% of them American, who also took 18 other questionnaires. Study 3’s are correlations, from −1 to 1: 0 is no relationship, and a minus sign means one score falls as the other rises.