Personality processes of everyday moral courage

Abstract

IntroductionMoral courage manifests in acts intended to intervene to stop or redress witnessed moral norm violations, despite the risk of negative consequences for the intervener. We investigate moral courage in everyday life and ask what personality processes are involved. Based on an extended process model of moral courage, we derived hypotheses on cognitive and emotional processes that should facilitate or hinder intervention. Further, we identified candidate personality dispositions that should shape these processes and thereby predict who tends to intervene against others' norm violations and who does not.MethodsUsing a quota‐based sample of the German population (N = 1108), we conducted a personality assessment, followed by a 7‐day experience sampling during which participants reported norm violations witnessed in their daily life as well as their cognitive, emotional, and behavioral reactions.ResultsIn total, 678 participants reported 1965 norm violations and intervened against 32% of them. Dispositional self‐efficacy facilitated intervention by increasing a sense of efficacy when confronted with others' norm violations. Conversely, dispositional moral disengagement hindered intervention by reducing perceived own responsibility.DiscussionOur findings provide novel insights into the situations affording moral courage in everyday life, and the personality processes that uniquely guide this behavior.

Why moral psychology needs personality psychology

“…Helzer and colleagues (2024) also show that “moral beacons” who self‐report high levels of morality and who others consider to be socially prominent received more nominations from their peers as being guides for moral thought and action. Finally, Baumert and colleagues (2024) showed that self‐reports of trait moral disengagement predicted fewer everyday acts of moral courage (assessed via experience sampling).…”

“…Sun and colleagues (2024) use open‐ended responses to comprehensively describe people's ordinary concepts of moral improvement. Baumert and colleagues (2024) use the experience sampling method to capture real‐world instances of moral courage when people are confronted with others' norm violations. Finally, three articles shed light on the personality predictors of consequential real‐world outcomes: COVID vaccination uptake (Zher‐Wen et al., 2024), receptiveness to ethically‐framed vegetarian advertisements (Smillie et al., 2024), and pledging to donate a substantial portion of one's lifetime income (Wilks et al., 2024).…”

“…Finally, Baumert and colleagues (2024) use experience sampling to uncover the cognitive and affective personality processes that link traits to instances of moral courage (i.e., intervention in the face of a norm violation) in the real world. They show that when controlling for all other dispositional and process variables, dispositional moral disengagement has a negative indirect effect on intervention via decreased perceptions of responsibility, whereas dispositional efficacy has a positive indirect effect on intervention via increased momentary feelings of efficacy.…”

Anger and disgust shape judgments of social sanctions across cultures, especially in high individual autonomy societies

“…A wide range of studies have investigated anger and disgust as reactions to norm violations. Such studies include norm violations where the violation causes harm 14,15 , is harmless but disgust-eliciting 16,17 , or is a relatively harmless everyday uncivil behavior 18 . Whether the norm being violated should be considered moral or merely conventional in these studies depend partly on one's culture and view of morality 19,20 .…”

240 Years of Public Discourse on Moral Courage in The London Times

“…This interpretation is often applied to politicians and other public figures in contrast to Zivilcourage which ordinary citizens show in their everyday lives (Schalk et al, 2023). Current studies have focused on the understanding and, for example, determinants of these concepts in today's societies (Baumert et al, 2023;Greitemeyer et al, 2007;Halmburger et al, 2017). Yet, there is little research that traces the evolution of the term and associated discourses over longer periods.…”