The influence of kill-save ratios and identifiability on moral judgments, Study 1, 2015

Abstract

This database pertains to the first study (Study 1 / 2015) of the research programme entitled: The influence of kill-save ratios and identifiability on moral judgments.

Below is the abstract of the research programme:

In moral dilemmas, decision-making can be based on more utilitarian or deontological reasoning. In a classical trolley dilemma, the indecision lies between choosing to sacrifice one person to save five (utilitarian decision) vs. not sacrificing a human life in any circumstances (deontological decision). In two experimental studies, we manipulated the number of people to be sacrificed (1 to save 5 vs. 3 to save 5) and whether personalizing information about them was presented. Results provide the first evidence of how the effects of kill-save ratios and identifiability of the potential victims are contingent on one another. Specifically, this research shows that when individuating information about the potential victims is present in a trolley dilemma, participants are more reluctant to sacrifice three persons to save five than to sacrifice one person to save five. When such individuating information is nor present, the acceptability of sacrificing the victims does not depend on their number.