Foreign-language effects in cross-cultural behavioral research: Evidence from the Tanzanian Hadza.

Behavioral research in traditional subsistence populations is often conducted in a non-native language. Recent studies show that non-native language-use systematically influences behavior, including in widely used methodologies. However, such studies are largely conducted in rich, industrialized societies, using at least one European language. This study expands sample diversity. We presented four standard tasks-a "dictator" game, two sacrificial dilemmas, a wager task, and five Likert-risk tolerance measures-to 129 Hadza participants. We randomly varied study languages-Hadzane and Kiswahili-between participants. We report a moderate impact of study language on wager decisions, alongside a substantial effect on dilemma decisions and responses to Likert-assessments of risk. As expected, non-native languages fostered utilitarian choices in sacrificial dilemmas. Unlike previous studies, non-native-language-use decreased risk preference in wager and Likert-tasks. We consider alternative explanatory mechanisms to account for this reversal, including linguistic relativity and cultural context. Given the strength of the effects reported here, we recommend, where possible, that future cross-cultural research should be conducted in participants' first language.

Does Embodying a Divine Avatar Influence Moral Decisions? An Immersive Virtual Reality Study.

The term Proteus effect refers to the changes in attitudes and behavior induced by the characteristics of an embodied virtual agent. Whether the effect can extend to the moral sphere is currently unknown. To deal with this issue, we investigated if embodying virtual agents (i.e., avatars) with different characteristics modulate people's moral standards differentially. Participants were requested to embody an avatar resembling the Christian God in His anthropomorphic appearance or a control human avatar and to perform a text-based version of incidental and instrumental dilemmas in a virtual environment. For each participant, we recorded (1) chosen options (deontological vs. utilitarian), (2) decision times, (3) postdecision feelings, and (4) physiological reactions (skin conductance response and heart rate). We found that embodying God vs. a control avatar did not change the performance in the moral dilemma task, indicating that no strong Proteus effect was at play in our experimental conditions. We interpreted this result by examining the constraints and limitations of our task, reasoning about the necessary conditions for eliciting the Proteus effect, and discussing future developments and advances in the field. Moreover, we presented compelling effects concerning dilemma type, chosen option, personality traits, and religion affiliation, thus supporting and extending literature on decision making in moral dilemmas.

Children's voices on their values and moral dilemmas when being cared and treated for cancer- a qualitative interview study.

BACKGROUND: Childhood cancers affect about 350 children every year in Sweden and are life-threatening diseases. During the treatment period, situations arise that can become morally challenging for the child. When knowing children's values and morally challenging situations in childhood cancer care, targeted ethics support could be developed and used in care. AIM: To explore children's values and moral dilemmas ​​when undergoing cancer treatment. METHODS: This is a qualitative study based on empirical data. The data collection was conducted through three focus group interviews and six individual interviews with children between 10 and 18 years (n = 16). A content analysis methodology was used to generate themes. Children who were/have been treated for cancer at three childhood cancer centres in Sweden were invited to participate. The study was approved by the Swedish Ethical Review Authority. The children's participation was based on voluntariness and consent/assent. FINDINGS: During the analysis, five themes of values emerged: Personal relationships, Bodily ease and identity, Feeling in control and being involved, Positive distractions and Right care that is needed. Their moral dilemmas were thematized into: Should I consider others or not? Should I rest or not? and Should I refuse treatment or not? CONCLUSION: Children undergoing cancer treatment want to have personal relationships with healthcare professionals. Their moral dilemmas were about questioning their own physical and psychological well-being against their expectations, the values of others and the treatment required. Further research is needed to understand how to deal with moral dilemmas in children undergoing cancer treatment.

"Doing being a good parent" in the pediatric clinic: Parents' knowledge displays in advice requests on infants' everyday care.

Parents and pediatricians play pivotal roles in promoting a nurturing environment for children's growth and development, especially during the critical first thousand days of life. Given the challenges involved in infant care and rearing, parents often rely on pediatricians' professional support in a wide range of daily caregiving practices as diverse as complementary feeding, hygiene management, pacifier use, or sleep routines. Nevertheless, little attention has been devoted to the in vivo observation of how parents actually request advice on babies' everyday care, and how pediatricians attend to such requests. By adopting a conversation analysis approach to a corpus of 23 videorecorded Italian pediatric well-child visits, the article explores the different ways through which parents navigate the face-threatening activity of soliciting the pediatrician's advice on infants' everyday care and management. The analysis illustrates that parents overall display (different degrees of) prior knowledge and competence on the topics brought to the pediatrician's attention while, at the same time, acknowledging the pediatrician's expertise and professional role. In this way, I argue that parents display themselves as competent, knowledgeable, caring, and therefore "good parents". After discussing the results, in the concluding remarks I point to what seems to be a cultural change in parent-healthcare provider interactions.

Social context during moral decision-making impacts males more than females.

Moral judgments are often viewed as the outcome of affective and deliberative processes that could be impacted by social factors and individual characteristics. The purpose of this study was to examine the interaction between gender and social context on moral judgment. Participants included 315 undergraduate students (67.3% female). The participants completed the Moral Decision-Making Task while seated at row tables facing the front of the room or round tables facing other participants. The results indicated that males responded in a more utilitarian manner (harm one to save five) than females for moral impersonal (MI) and moral personal (MP) dilemmas regardless of seating arrangements. When seated at round tables, all participants were more likely to respond deontologically (cause no harm) to the moral impersonal dilemmas. In addition, we calculated a moral reasoning difference score for each participant as the difference between the MI and MP scores to represent additional reactivity due to the idea of taking direct action. The moral reasoning difference score was consistent for females but indicated a more deontological response from males at round tables and a more utilitarian response from males at row tables. These results suggest that males are more utilitarian than females and are more likely to be influenced by social context when responding to moral dilemmas. More broadly, the current results indicate that moral judgments are affected by social context particularly in males in ways that have not been incorporated in many models of moral decision making.

Moral caring competency and moral distress among Ghanaian nurses in adult care settings: A descriptive-correlational study.

Background: Nurses in adult care settings frequently encounter moral distress due to the daily ethical obligations they must fulfill. In contrast to other healthcare professionals, nurses often grapple with a heightened frequency of moral dilemmas, resulting in increased moral distress. Objective: This study aimed to explore the levels and relationship between moral caring competency and moral distress among Ghanaian nurses in adult care settings. Methods: This quantitative study utilized a descriptive-correlational design. A multistage sampling was used to select three public hospitals. Simple random sampling was used to recruit 231 nurses from the three public hospitals. Data were collected from June to July 2023 using validated questionnaires. The study utilized frequency and percentages, mean and standard deviation, and Spearman's Correlation. Results: The nurses had a low level of moral caring competency (M = 2.18, SD = 0.340). The composite moral distress score was 227.31, indicating a high level of moral distress among the nurses. Furthermore, there was a moderate, negative significant relationship between moral caring competency and moral distress (rs = -.474, N = 231, p <0.001). Conclusions: Nurses in public hospitals had limited personal cognitive, affective, and psychomotor abilities to address patient moral issues. The nurses also experience significant moral distress when delivering patient care. Furthermore, to decrease the level of moral distress, moral caring competency should be strengthened among nurses. Therefore, it is recommended that nurse administrators provide adequate organizational support and implement continuous moral training to improve nurses' moral caring competency and mitigate their moral distress. Healthcare policymakers are encouraged to develop or refine policies to navigate moral dilemmas and reduce moral distress among nurses. Future studies employing qualitative designs can explore the influence of culture on moral caring competency within the Ghanaian setting.

Pulling the lever in a hurry: the influence of impulsivity and sensitivity to reward on moral decision-making under time pressure.

BACKGROUND: Making timely moral decisions can save a life. However, literature on how moral decisions are made under time pressure reports conflicting results. Moreover, it is unclear whether and how moral choices under time pressure may be influenced by personality traits like impulsivity and sensitivity to reward and punishment. METHODS: To address these gaps, in this study we employed a moral dilemma task, manipulating decision time between participants: one group (N = 25) was subjected to time pressure (TP), with 8 s maximum time for response (including the reading time), the other (N = 28) was left free to take all the time to respond (noTP). We measured type of choice (utilitarian vs. non-utilitarian), decision times, self-reported unpleasantness and arousal during decision-making, and participants' impulsivity and BIS-BAS sensitivity. RESULTS: We found no group effect on the type of choice, suggesting that time pressure per se did not influence moral decisions. However, impulsivity affected the impact of time pressure, in that individuals with higher cognitive instability showed slower response times under no time constraint. In addition, higher sensitivity to reward predicted a higher proportion of utilitarian choices regardless of the time available for decision. CONCLUSIONS: Results are discussed within the dual-process theory of moral judgement, revealing that the impact of time pressure on moral decision-making might be more complex and multifaceted than expected, potentially interacting with a specific facet of attentional impulsivity.

Unveiling the Paradox of Selflessness: Exploring Perceptions of Hypocrisy and Priority Outgroup in Intergroup Moral Dilemmas.

Purpose: This study examines the impact of prioritizing the out-group in intergroup moral dilemmas. The research aims to achieve three primary objectives: 1) investigating the relationship between out-group prioritization and perceptions of hypocrisy, 2) exploring the influence of perceived hypocrisy and negative emotions on moral judgments, and 3) uncovering the underlying reasons for perceiving outgroup prioritization as hypocritical. Methods: Experiments 1, 2 and 3 involved presenting Chinese participants with out-group rescuers and in-group rescuers and asking them to rate the two on three dimensions: level of hypocrisy, level of morality, and negative emotions toward the rescuers. In Experiment 3, the degree of similarity between participants and rescuers was manipulated to control for the level at which participants projected their own intrinsic motivations (ie, self-interest) onto the rescuers. Results: Experiments 1 and 2 jointly showed that participants perceived the out-group rescuer as more hypocritical and immoral compared to the in-group rescuer, and that participants had stronger negative emotions toward the out-group rescuer. Mediation analysis also demonstrated that the perception of hypocrisy and negative emotions largely mediated the relationship between the different rescuers and participants' evaluation of the rescuers' morality. In Experiment 3, participants gave higher hypocrisy ratings to high projection out-group rescuers compared to low projection out-group rescuers. Conclusion: In intergroup dilemmas, choosing to sacrifice the in-group to rescue the outgroup is perceived as more hypocritical, immoral, and objectionable. Perceived hypocrisy arises from an incongruity between individuals' subjective judgments of the rescuers' self-interest motives and the altruistic choice made by the rescuers to rescue the out-group.

Bioética en el posapocalipsis zombi en la película Guerra Mundial Z

Propósito/Contexto. Este artículo se propone discutir dos debates éticos. El primero sobre la relativización de las nociones de vida, enfermedad y tratamiento; el segundo sobre la garantía de los derechos de los individuos en un contexto de incertidumbre global, en la película Guerra Mundial Z. Metodología/Enfoque. Para analizar esta película se optó por la estrategia metodológica del análisis del discurso multimodal propuesto por Bo, que se realiza a partir de tres planos: el plano del contexto cultural, en donde se ubica la ideología y el género; el plano del contexto situacional, en donde se ubica la construcción de sentido a través del discurso; y el plano del significado de la imagen. Resultados/Hallazgos. En esta investigación se encontró que el debate ético sobre la noción de vida, enfermedad y tratamiento se enfrenta a una actualización del concepto «vida» y de las estrategias de sobrevivencia a partir de la deshumanización del contagiado. Discusión/Conclusiones/Contribuciones. Guerra Mundial Z expone las acciones de sobrevivencia de la humanidad, en un contexto de incertidumbre global. Ese contexto lleva a deshumanizar a los infectados para justificar las acciones en su contra y al ejercicio de la razón instrumental para garantizar la protección individual.

Purpose / Context: This article aims to discuss two ethical debates, the first on the relativization of the notions of life, disease, and treatment and the second on guaranteeing the rights of individuals in a context of global uncertainty in the film World War Z. Methodology / Approach: To analyze this film, the methodological strategy of multimodal discourse analysis proposed by (Bo 2018) raises the analysis from three levels: the level of the cultural context where ideology and gender are located; the plane of the situational context where the construction of meaning is located through discourse and the plane of the meaning of the image. Results / Findings: In this research, it was found that the ethical debate on the notion of life, disease, and treatment faces an update of the concept of "life" and of the survival strategies based on the dehumanization of the infected person. Discussion / Conclusions / Contributions: World War Z exposes the survival actions of humanity in a new reality of global uncertainty that leads to the dehumanization of the infected to justify the actions against them and the exercise of instrumental reason to guarantee individual protection.

Objetivo / Contexto: Este artigo tem como objetivo discutir dois debates éticos, o primeiro sobre a relativização das noções de vida, doença e tratamento e o segundo sobre a garantia dos direitos dos indivíduos em um contexto de incerteza global no filme World War Z. Metodologia / Abordagem: Para analisar este filme, optou-se pela estratégia metodológica da análise do discurso multimodal proposta por (Bo 2018), que levanta a análise a partir de três níveis: o nível do contexto cultural onde se situam a ideologia e o gênero; o plano do contexto situacional onde se localiza a construção do sentido através do discurso e o plano do sentido da imagem. Resultados / Achados: Nesta pesquisa constatou-se que o debate ético sobre a noção de vida, doença e tratamento enfrenta uma atualização do conceito de "vida" e das estratégias de sobrevivência a partir da desumanização da pessoa infectada. Discussão / Conclusões / Contribuições: A Guerra Mundial Z expõe as ações de sobrevivência da humanidade em uma nova realidade de incerteza global que leva à desumanização dos infectados para justificar as ações contra eles e ao exercício da razão instrumental para garantir a proteção individual.

Criterios para el análisis y evaluación de casos en la educación moral / Criteria for the analysis and evaluation of cases in moral education / Critérios para a análise e avaliação de casos na educação moral

Resumen (descriptivo): El objetivo central del artículo es proponer unos criterios para el análisis y evaluación de casos en la educación moral. Los criterios que se proponen son cuatro: 1) la identificación de los dilemas morales que se encuentran en la narración del caso; 2) el análisis de las circunstancias y hechos; 3) la consistencia argumentativa; y 4) la justificación moral de las alternativas de decisión. Estos criterios sirven para orientar los procesos pedagógicos en el aula a partir de casos con dilemas que fortalecen el desarrollo del juicio moral. Los docentes pueden adoptar los criterios para orientar sus clases y evaluar el desempeño de sus estudiantes. Los criterios propuestos pueden ser implementados tanto en la educación básica y media como superior.

Abstract (descriptive): The central objective of the article is to propose different criteria for the analysis and evaluation of cases in moral education. The article proposes four criteria: 1) the identification of moral dilemmas that are identified in the narration of the case; 2) the analysis of facts and circumstances; 3) argumentative consistency and 4) the moral justification of the alternatives for moral decisions that students identify. These criteria serve to guide pedagogical processes in the classroom through cases with dilemmas that strengthen the development of students' moral judgment. Teachers can adopt these criteria for use in their classrooms and to evaluate the performance of their students. The proposed criteria can be implemented in both secondary and higher education.

Resumo (descritivo): O principal objetivo do trabalho é propor critérios para a análise e avaliação de casos na educação moral. Os critérios propostos são quatro: 1) a identificação de dilemas morais encontrados na narrativa do processo; 2) Análise das circunstâncias e fatos; 3) consistência argumentativa e 4) a justificação moral das alternativas decisão moral feitas pela mesma. Estes critérios servem para orientar os processos de aprendizagem na sala de aula a partir de casos com dilemas que fortalecem o desenvolvimento do juízo moral. Os professores podem adotar os critérios para orientar suas aulas e avaliar o desempenho de seus alunos. Os critérios propostos podem ser implementados tanto no ensino primário e secundário como superior.