Moral character Predominates in Person Perception and Evaluation

Goodwin, Geoffrey P.

doi:10.1037/e505052014-024

Cited by 159 publications

(303 citation statements)

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“…This investigation dovetails nicely with existing socialcognition work demonstrating that moral character is at the heart of person perception (N. H. Anderson, 1968;Goodwin et al, 2014;Wojciszke et al, 1998). Our results show that the primacy of morality extends beyond impression formation to individual-identity recognition more generally.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 89%

Neurodegeneration and Identity

2015

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There is a widespread notion, both within the sciences and among the general public, that mental deterioration can rob individuals of their identity. Yet there have been no systematic investigations of what types of cognitive damage lead people to appear to no longer be themselves. We measured perceived identity change in patients with three kinds of neurodegenerative disease: frontotemporal dementia, Alzheimer's disease, and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. Structural equation models revealed that injury to the moral faculty plays the primary role in identity discontinuity. Other cognitive deficits, including amnesia, have no measurable impact on identity persistence. Accordingly, frontotemporal dementia has the greatest effect on perceived identity, and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis has the least. We further demonstrated that perceived identity change fully mediates the impact of neurodegenerative disease on relationship deterioration between patient and caregiver. Our results mark a departure from theories that ground personal identity in memory, distinctiveness, dispositional emotion, or global mental function.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 89%

Neurodegeneration and Identity

2015

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“…Instead, consistent with other psychological research and theory (e.g., Brambilla et al ; Goodwin ) bankruptcy stigma can be broken down into elements of warmth, competence, and morality. The distinction between these evaluations is important because morality (e.g., responsible, honest, trustworthy) is more consequential than warmth (e.g., agreeable, easygoing, enthusiastic) in forming impressions of others (Goodwin ; Goodwin, Piazza, and Rozin ). Across different reasons for filing for bankruptcy, warmth evaluations of filers do not vary as much as morality and competence evaluations, possibly because people feel some pity for bankruptcy filers; pity has previously been linked to warmth (Fiske, Cuddy, and Glick ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In Study 2, we examine evaluations of the warmth, competence, and morality of bankruptcy filers (see e.g., Brambilla et al ; Cuddy, Fiske, and Glick , ; Fiske, Cuddy, and Glick ; Goodwin ; Goodwin, Piazza, and Rozin ; Leach, Ellemers, and Barreto )—as such, this study measures bankruptcy stigma in terms of filers' intent, ability, and social correctness. To add to our findings from Study 1, we explore the relationship between these evaluations and demographic characteristics, including familiarity with bankruptcy.…”

Section: Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Early work by Fiske, Cuddy, and Glick posited that warmth included perceptions of morality, but more recent research separates morality into its own dimension (Brambilla et al ; Goodwin ; Goodwin, Piazza, and Rozin ; Leach, Ellemers, and Barreto ). For instance, Leach, Ellemers, and Barreto () note that “a group may be moral (i.e., honest and trustworthy) without necessarily being sociable (i.e., warm and friendly), and vice versa” (235).…”

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confidence: 99%

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Consumer Bankruptcy Stigma: Understanding Relationships with Familiarity and Perceived Control

Chin¹,

Cohen²,

Lindblad³

2018

Journal of Consumer Affairs

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Bankruptcy stigma is commonly thought to influence debtors' bankruptcy filing decisions. Despite its importance, researchers have not collected direct quantitative measures of bankruptcy stigma, either in terms of attitudes toward bankruptcy or evaluations of filers. Across two empirical studies, we find that (1) attitudes toward bankruptcy and bankruptcy filers are less negative among those with firsthand bankruptcy experience; (2) bankruptcy stigma is a multidimensional construct that includes morality‐, warmth‐, and competence‐related elements; and (3) consistent with psychological models of blame, filers who are perceived to have more control over the circumstances leading to their bankruptcy are more highly stigmatized. By directly investigating bankruptcy stigma, this research can be used to inform models of consumer decisions about bankruptcy filings and bankruptcy policy.

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“…A belief in enduring character traits is at the heart of much of social life: What purpose would job interviews, first dates, personal recommendations, social reputations, and virtually any other conduit of information about “what a person is like” serve if people did not fundamentally believe in the notion of character? Indeed, recent evidence suggests that assessments of moral character, more than assessments of competence and warmth, are central to social inference and evaluation (Goodwin, Piazza, & Rozin, ) and comprise the core of naïve notions of personal identity (Strohminger & Nichols, ). Thus, it is crucial for psychological scientists to explore the validity and accuracy of these perceptions and judgments in order to “square” our claims about human morality (namely, the causes of moral and immoral behavior) with people's intuitive understanding of the social world.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Character: The Prospects for a Personality‐Based Perspective on Morality

Fleeson

Furr

Jayawickreme

et al. 2014

Social & Personality Psych

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In the early parts of the 20th century, character made up a major part of psychology, specifically of personality psychology. However, an influential observational study of children's moral behavior, conducted by Hartshorne, May, and colleagues in the 1920s, suggested that consistency in morality‐related behavior was lower than many people expected. Some psychologists interpreted such results to mean that there was no consistency in moral behavior and thus that there were no stable, meaningful individual differences in moral behavior – character did not exist. Recent years have witnessed a reinvigoration of character, ethics, and morality as objects of psychological study. Our purpose in this paper is to contribute to this reinvigoration by reviewing the use of the concept of “character” within psychology, considering whether the evidence supports the notion of moral character as a psychological construct, and suggesting new prospects for research on moral character.

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Moral character Predominates in Person Perception and Evaluation

Cited by 159 publications

References 0 publications

Neurodegeneration and Identity

Neurodegeneration and Identity

Consumer Bankruptcy Stigma: Understanding Relationships with Familiarity and Perceived Control

Character: The Prospects for a Personality‐Based Perspective on Morality

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