友善重要, 还是公平重要?亲社会性与公平性调节复杂道德判断

doi:10.3724/SP.J.1041.2024.01541

摘要/Abstract

摘要：

本研究通过两个实验探讨了第三方判断者对既包含亲社会性又涉及公平性的复杂道德决策进行判断时, 如何权衡二者的重要性以及在此过程中, 判断者与决策者之间社会距离的作用。实验中, 被试作为第三方观看决策者在复杂道德任务中做出的决策并对其道德水平进行判断。决策者完成的任务包含如何在自我和他人之间分配代币(亲社会性)以及如何将分给他人的代币在两名接受者之间分配(公平性)。结果发现：1) 决策的亲社会性和公平性对道德判断的影响并不是相对独立的, 而是存在交互作用。高亲社会条件下, 公平与不公平决策的道德评分之差显著大于低亲社会条件下二者之差; 在神经层面上, 发现脑电成分FRN和P3的波幅呈现与行为一致的模式; 2) 对高亲社会而不公平的决策进行判断时, 当决策者与被试社会距离更近时, 被试对其道德评分降低但合作意愿反而升高, 表现出道德评分与合作意愿的分离。本研究表明, 在对包含多种成分的复杂道德决策进行判断时, 亲社会性和公平性并不是相对独立, 而是交互地共同影响判断。本研究揭示了道德判断的灵活性以及各道德因素之间的相互影响, 为探讨不同社会情境下的复杂道德判断的心理机制提供了新思路。

关键词: 亲社会, 公平, 复杂道德判断, 事件相关电位, 反馈相关负波

Abstract:

Moral judgment involves assessing actions that carry moral weight against established ethical standards. Recent research has revealed the separate effects of fairness and prosociality--through personal actions intended to benefit others--on moral judgment. However, the ingroup bias in prosocial behaviors may sometimes conflict with the principle of fairness. Little is known about the mechanism underlying the moral judgment of such complex moral decisions, i.e., when both prosociality and fairness are embedded in the decisions. To explore this, we utilized a modified dictator game task to examine how prosociality and fairness jointly modulate moral judgments and the role of social distance in these judgments.

In our first experiment (Experiment 1), 90 participants (37 females, 22.73 ± 3.08 years) participated as third-party judges. They evaluated decisions made by others who varied in social distance on a resource allocation task. In the resource allocation task, the decision makers were given 100 money units by the system while two strangers were facing the threat of a highly unpleasant noise. They need to decide 1) how many money units they would like to donate to reduce the duration of the two strangers’ noise (i.e., prosociality) and 2) how to allocate the donated money units between the two strangers (i.e., fairness). The results showed that under conditions of high prosociality, the discrepancy in moral ratings between “fair” and “unfair” decisions was significantly larger compared to conditions of low prosociality. Notably, participants rated decisions made by their friends higher and those by strangers lower, establishing a clear “interpersonal hierarchy”.

A total of 41 participants (21 females, 21.15 ± 2.36 years) participated in Experiment 2, where event-related potential (ERP) technology was employed further explore the cognitive neurobiological mechanisms of prosociality and fairness affecting moral judgments. This experiment expanded the scope of social distance to include broader group dynamics, including ingroup and outgroup distinctions, and evaluated willingness to cooperate as a potential influencing factor in future decisions. The findings mirrored those of Experiment 1: high prosociality heightened sensitivity to fairness. Behaviorally, under high prosocial conditions, participants issued lower moral judgments but expressed a higher willingness to cooperate when ingroup members made unfair decisions compared to outgroup members. At the neural level, when ingroup members demonstrated high prosociality, the ERP components (Feedback related negativity and P3) showed significantly greater amplitudes in response to fair versus unfair decisions.

Overall, these results suggest that prosociality and fairness dynamically interact to shape third-party moral judgments while high prosociality enhances the influence of fairness. This study also highlights how moral judgment adapts based on social proximity to decision-makers, revealing intricate temporal dynamics in how prosociality and fairness are processed while creating moral judgments. This research offers a new methodological approach to understanding the complex cognitive neurobiological mechanisms underlying moral judgment in varying social contexts.

Key words: prosociality, fairness, moral judgment, event-related potentials, feedback related negativity

中图分类号:

B849: C91

吴珺, 李晚晨, 姚晓欢, 刘洁, 崔芳. (2024). 友善重要, 还是公平重要?亲社会性与公平性调节复杂道德判断. 心理学报, 56(11), 1541-1555.

WU Jun, LI Wanchen, YAO Xiaohuan, LIU Jie, CUI Fang. (2024). Kindness or fairness: Prosociality and fairness jointly modulate moral judgments. Acta Psychologica Sinica, 56(11), 1541-1555.

图/表 6

图1 实验设计 (A) 4种条件示意图; (B)试次流程图注：实验1中为密友/熟人/陌生人, 实验2中为本校/外校; 红色框住的部分表示ERP分析的时间窗。彩图见电子版。

图2 实验1行为结果 (A)亲社会与公平的交互作用示意图; (B)公平性与社会距离的交互作用示意图注：*: p < 0.05; **: p < 0.01; ***: p < 0.001; n.s.: p > 0.05, 下同

图3 实验2行为结果 (A)道德评分上的亲社会×公平的二阶交互作用; (B)道德评分上的亲社会×公平×社会距离的三阶交互作用; (C)合作意愿上的亲社会×公平的二阶交互作用; (D)合作意愿上的亲社会×公平×社会距离的三阶交互作用

图4 FRN成分二重交互结果示意图。(A) 4种条件在Fz、FCz合并为一个电极点上的ERP总平均波形图; (B) 2种条件在Fz、FCz合并为一个电极点上的差异波总平均波形图; (C) 2种条件在220~260 ms时间窗内的ERP地形图

图5 FRN成分三重交互结果示意图。(A) 8种条件在Fz、FCz合并为一个电极点上的ERP总平均波形图; (B) 4种条件在Fz、FCz合并为一个电极点上的差异波总平均波形图; (C) 4种条件在220~260 ms时间窗内的ERP地形图

图6 P3成分结果示意图。(A) 4种条件在CP1、CP2、CPz、P1、P2、Pz合并为一个电极点上的ERP总平均波形图; (B) 4种条件在330~430 ms时间窗内的ERP地形图

参考文献 64

[1]	Abrams, D., Palmer, S. B., Rutland, A., Cameron, L., & van De Vyver, J. (2014). Evaluations of and reasoning about normative and deviant ingroup and outgroup members: Development of the black sheep effect. Developmental Psychology, 50(1), 258-270. doi: 10.1037/a0032461 pmid: 23544855
[2]	Aron, A., Aron, E. N., & Smollan, D. (1992). Inclusion of Other in the Self Scale and the structure of interpersonal closeness. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 63(4), 596-612.
[3]	Balliet, D., Wu, J., & De Dreu, C. K. W. (2014). Ingroup favoritism in cooperation: A meta-analysis. Psychological Bulletin, 140(6), 1556-1581. doi: 10.1037/a0037737 pmid: 25222635
[4]	Barclay, P., & Barker, J. L. (2020). Greener Than Thou: People who protect the environment are more cooperative, compete to be environmental, and benefit from reputation. Journal of Environmental Psychology, 72, 101441.
[5]	Batson, C. D. (1987). Prosocial motivation:Is it ever truly altruistic? In L. Berkowitz (Ed.), Advances in Experimental Social Psychology (Vol. 20, pp. 65-122). Elsevier.
[6]	Boksem, M. A. S., & De Cremer, D. (2010). Fairness concerns predict medial frontal negativity amplitude in ultimatum bargaining. Social Neuroscience, 5(1), 118-125. doi: 10.1080/17470910903202666 pmid: 19851940
[7]	Carlo, G. (2014). The development and correlates of prosocial moral behaviors. In M. Killen & J. G. Smetana (Eds.), Handbook of moral development (2nd ed., pp. 208-234). Psychology Press.
[8]	Cohen, D. J., & Ahn, M. (2016). A subjective utilitarian theory of moral judgment. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 145(10), 1359-1381.
[9]	Critcher, C. R., Inbar, Y., & Pizarro, D. A. (2013). How quick decisions illuminate moral character. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 4(3), 308-315.
[10]	Crockett, M. J., Kurth-Nelson, Z., Siegel, J. Z., Dayan, P., & Dolan, R. J. (2014). Harm to others outweighs harm to self in moral decision making. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 111(48), 17320-17325.
[11]	Cui, F., Nan, Y., & Luo, Y. (2008). A review of cognitive neuroscience studies on empathy. Advances in Psychological Science, 16(2), 250-254.
	[崔芳, 南云, 罗跃嘉. (2008). 共情的认知神经研究回顾. 心理科学进展, 16(2), 250-254.]
[12]	Delorme, A., & Makeig, S. (2004). EEGLAB: An open source toolbox for analysis of single-trial EEG dynamics including independent component analysis. Journal of Neuroscience Methods, 134(1), 9-21. doi: 10.1016/j.jneumeth.2003.10.009 pmid: 15102499
[13]	Eyal, T., Liberman, N., & Trope, Y. (2008). Judging near and distant virtue and vice. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 44(4), 1204-1209. doi: 10.1016/j.jesp.2008.03.012 pmid: 19554217
[14]	Fareri, D. S., Chang, L. J., & Delgado, M. R. (2012). Effects of direct social experience on trust decisions and neural reward circuitry. Frontiers in Neuroscience, 6(148), 1-17.
[15]	Faul, F., Erdfelder, E., Lang, A. -G., & Buchner, A. (2007). GPower 3: A flexible statistical power analysis program for the social, behavioral, and biomedical sciences. Behavior Research Methods*, 39(2), 175-191. doi: 10.3758/bf03193146 pmid: 17695343
[16]	Fehr, E., & Gächter, S. (2002). Altruistic punishment in humans. Nature, 415(6868), 137-140.
[17]	Fowler, Z., Law, K. F., & Gaesser, B. (2021). Against empathy bias: The moral value of equitable empathy. Psychological Science, 32(5), 766-779.
[18]	Gehring, W. J., & Willoughby, A. R. (2002). The medial frontal cortex and the rapid processing of monetary gains and losses. Science, 295(5563), 2279-2282. pmid: 11910116
[19]	Glazer, J. E., Kelley, N. J., Pornpattananangkul, N., Mittal, V. A., & Nusslock, R. (2018). Beyond the FRN: Broadening the time-course of EEG and ERP components implicated in reward processing. International Journal of Psychophysiology, 132, 184-202. doi: S0167-8760(17)30473-7 pmid: 29454641
[20]	Goldstein, N. J., & Cialdini, R. B. (2007). The spyglass self: A model of vicarious self-perception. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 92(3), 402-417. pmid: 17352600
[21]	Greene, J. D., Nystrom, L. E., Engell, A. D., Darley, J. M., & Cohen, J. D. (2004). The neural bases of cognitive conflict and control in moral judgment. Neuron, 44(2), 389-400. doi: 10.1016/j.neuron.2004.09.027 pmid: 15473975
[22]	Haidt, J. (2007). The new synthesis in moral psychology. Science, 316(5827), 998-1002. doi: 10.1126/science.1137651 pmid: 17510357
[23]	Han, S. (2018). Neurocognitive basis of racial ingroup bias in empathy. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 22(5), 400-421. doi: S1364-6613(18)30049-4 pmid: 29563059
[24]	Hardy, C. L., & van Vugt, M. (2006). Nice guys finish first: The competitive altruism hypothesis. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 32(10), 1402-1413. pmid: 16963610
[25]	He, Y., Hu, X., & Mai, X. (2022). Influence of empathic concern on fairness-related decision making: Evidence from ERP. Acta Psychologica Sinica, 54(4), 385-397. doi: 10.3724/SP.J.1041.2022.00385
	[何怡娟, 胡馨木, 买晓琴. (2022). 共情关怀对公平决策的影响——来自ERP的证据. 心理学报, 54(4), 385-397.] doi: 10.3724/SP.J.1041.2022.00385
[26]	Hein, G., Silani, G., Preuschoff, K., Batson, C. D., & Singer, T. (2010). Neural responses to ingroup and outgroup members’ suffering predict individual differences in costly helping. Neuron, 68(1), 149-160.
[27]	Hewig, J., Kretschmer, N., Trippe, R. H., Hecht, H., Coles, M. G. H., Holroyd, C. B., & Miltner, W. H. R. (2011). Why humans deviate from rational choice. Psychophysiology, 48(4), 507-514. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-8986.2010.01081.x pmid: 20667034
[28]	Hu, X., & Mai, X. (2021). Social value orientation modulates fairness processing during social decision-making: Evidence from behavior and brain potentials. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 16(7), 670-682.
[29]	Jordan, J. J., Hoffman, M., Bloom, P., & Rand, D. G. (2016). Third-party punishment as a costly signal of trustworthiness. Nature, 530(7591), 473-476.
[30]	Jung, T., Makeig, S., Westerfield, M., Townsend, J., Courchesne, E., & Sejnowski, T. J. (2001). Analysis and visualization of single‐trial event‐related potentials. Human Brain Mapping, 14(3), 166-185. doi: 10.1002/hbm.1050 pmid: 11559961
[31]	Kogut, T., & Kogut, E. (2013). Exploring the relationship between adult attachment style and the identifiable victim effect in helping behavior. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 49(4), 651-660.
[32]	Lahat, A., Helwig, C. C., & Zelazo, P. D. (2013). An event‐related potential study of adolescents’ and young adults’ judgments of moral and social conventional violations. Child Development, 84(3), 955-969.
[33]	Leng, Y., & Zhou, X. (2010). Modulation of the brain activity in outcome evaluation by interpersonal relationship: An ERP study. Neuropsychologia, 48(2), 448-455. doi: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2009.10.002 pmid: 19822163
[34]	Levine, M., & Thompson, K. (2004). Identity, place, and bystander intervention: Social categories and helping after natural disasters. The Journal of Social Psychology, 144(3), 229-245.
[35]	Levine, M., Prosser, A., Evans, D., & Reicher, S. (2005). Identity and emergency intervention: How social group membership and inclusiveness of group boundaries shape helping behavior. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 31(4), 443-453. doi: 10.1177/0146167204271651 pmid: 15743980
[36]	Li, P., Jia, S., Feng, T., Liu, Q., Suo, T., & Li, H. (2010). The influence of the diffusion of responsibility effect on outcome evaluations: Electrophysiological evidence from an ERP study. NeuroImage, 52(4), 1727-1733. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2010.04.275 pmid: 20452440
[37]	Longobardi, E., Spataro, P., & Rossi-Arnaud, C. (2019). Direct and indirect associations of empathy, theory of mind, and language with prosocial behavior: Gender differences in primary school children. The Journal of Genetic Psychology, 180(6), 266-279.
[38]	Lu, J., Peng, X., Liao, C., & Cui, F. (2019). The stereotype of professional roles influences neural responses to moral transgressions: ERP evidence. Biological Psychology, 145, 55-61. doi: S0301-0511(18)30882-2 pmid: 31005611
[39]	Martin, J. W., & Cushman, F. (2015). To punish or to leave: Distinct cognitive processes underlie partner control and partner choice behaviors. PLOS ONE, 10(4), e0125193.
[40]	McAuliffe, K., Blake, P. R., Steinbeis, N., & Warneken, F. (2017). The developmental foundations of human fairness. Nature Human Behaviour, 1(2), 0042.
[41]	McAuliffe, K., & Dunham, Y. (2016). Group bias in cooperative norm enforcement. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 371(1686), 20150073.
[42]	Mendoza, S. A., Lane, S. P., & Amodio, D. M. (2014). For members only: Ingroup punishment of fairness norm violations in the ultimatum game. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 5(6), 662-670.
[43]	Morese, R., Rabellino, D., Sambataro, F., Perussia, F., Valentini, M. C., Bara, B. G., & Bosco, F. M. (2016). Group membership modulates the neural circuitry underlying third party punishment. PLOS ONE, 11(11), e0166357.
[44]	Polezzi, D., Sartori, G., Rumiati, R., Vidotto, G., & Daum, I. (2010). Brain correlates of risky decision-making. NeuroImage, 49(2), 1886-1894. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2009.08.068 pmid: 19761850
[45]	Rom, S. C., & Conway, P. (2018). The strategic moral self: Self-presentation shapes moral dilemma judgments. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 74, 24-37.
[46]	Sheng, F., & Han, S. (2012). Manipulations of cognitive strategies and intergroup relationships reduce the racial bias in empathic neural responses. NeuroImage, 61(4), 786-797. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2012.04.028 pmid: 22542636
[47]	Soter, L. K., Berg, M. K., Gelman, S. A., & Kross, E. (2021). What we would (but shouldn’t) do for those we love: Universalism versus partiality in responding to others’ moral transgressions. Cognition, 217, 104886.
[48]	Sun, X., & Wu, M. (2013). The effect of social distance on moral judgment. Chinese Journal of Applied Psychology, 19(2), 111-118.
	[孙晓玲, 吴明证. (2013). 社会距离知觉对道德判断的影响研究. 应用心理学, 19(2), 111-118.]
[49]	Wang, Y., Kuhlman, D. M., Roberts, K., Yuan, B., Zhang, Z., Zhang, W., & Simons, R. F. (2017). Social value orientation modulates the FRN and P300 in the chicken game. Biological Psychology, 127, 89-98. doi: S0301-0511(17)30081-9 pmid: 28465046
[50]	Wang, Zhen., & Jiang, W.(2016). The context-dependency of fairness processing: Evidence from behavior study. Studies of Psychology and Behavior, 14(5), 600-604.
	[王珍珍, 蒋文明. (2016). 公平加工的情境依赖性: 来自行为的证据. 心理与行为研究, 14(5), 600-604.]
[51]	Wu, Y., Leliveld, M. C., & Zhou, X. (2011). Social distance modulates recipient’s fairness consideration in the dictator game: An ERP study. Biological Psychology, 88(2-3), 253-262.
[52]	Wu, Y., & Zhou, X. (2009). The P300 and reward valence, magnitude, and expectancy in outcome evaluation. Brain Research, 1286, 114-122. doi: 10.1016/j.brainres.2009.06.032 pmid: 19539614
[53]	Xu, J., Sun, X., Dong, Y., Wang, Z., Li, W., & Yuan, B. (2017). Compensation or punishment?——The effect of social distance on third-party intervention. Journal of Psychological Science, 40(5), 1175-1181.
	[徐杰, 孙向超, 董悦, 汪祚军, 李伟强, 袁博. (2017). 人情与公正的抉择: 社会距离对第三方干预的影响. 心理科学, 40(5), 1175-1181.]
[54]	Xu, Q., He, S., Li, Z., Duan, R., & Li, P. (2023). Voluntary or reluctant? Social influence in charitable giving: An ERP study. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 18(1), nsad010.
[55]	Yu, H., Siegel, J. Z., Clithero, J. A., & Crockett, M. J. (2021). How peer influence shapes value computation in moral decision-making. Cognition, 211, 104641.
[56]	Yu, R., Hu, P., & Zhang, P. (2015). Social distance and anonymity modulate fairness consideration: An ERP study. Scientific Reports, 5(1), 13452.
[57]	Zhan, B., Du, B., Chen, S., Li, Y., He, W., & Luo, W. (2020). Moral judgment modulates fairness consideration in the early outcome evaluation stage. Chinese Science Bulletin, 65(19), 1985-1995.
	[占斌, 杜碧煊, 陈绍华, 李轶文, 何蔚祺, 罗文波. (2020). 道德判断影响大脑对公平行为的早期评价. 科学通报, 65(19), 1985-1995.]
[58]	Zhan, Y., Xiao, X., Tan, Q., Li, J., & Zhong, Y. (2022). Influence of reputational concern and social distance on moral decision-making under the harmful dilemma: Evidence from behavioral and ERPs study. Acta Psychologica Sinica, 54(6), 613-627. doi: 10.3724/SP.J.1041.2022.00613
	[占友龙, 肖啸, 谭千保, 李琎, 钟毅平. (2022). 声誉关注与社会距离对伤害困境中道德决策的影响:来自行为与ERPs的证据. 心理学报, 54(6), 613-627.] doi: 10.3724/SP.J.1041.2022.00613
[59]	Zhang, D., Lin, Y., Jing, Y., Feng, C., & Gu, R. (2019). The dynamics of belief updating in human cooperation: Findings from inter-brain ERP hyperscanning. NeuroImage, 198, 1-12. doi: S1053-8119(19)30421-5 pmid: 31085300
[60]	Zhang, Z., Qi, C., Wang, Y., Zhao, H., Wang, X., & Gao, X. (2020). In-group favoritism or the black sheep effect? Group bias of fairness norm enforcement during economic games. Advances in Psychological Science, 28(2), 329-339. doi: 10.3724/SP.J.1042.2020.00329
	[张振, 齐春辉, 王洋, 赵辉, 王小新, 高晓雷. (2020). 内群体偏爱或黑羊效应?经济博弈中公平规范执行的群体偏见. 心理科学进展, 28(2), 329-339.] doi: 10.3724/SP.J.1042.2020.00329
[61]	Zhao, H., Xu, Y., Li, L., Liu, J., & Cui, F. (2024). The neural mechanisms of identifiable victim effect in prosocial decision-making. Human Brain Mapping, 45(2), e26609.
[62]	Zhou, Y., Gao, T., Zhang, T., Li, W., Wu, T., Han, X., & Han, S. (2020). Neural dynamics of racial categorization predicts racial bias in face recognition and altruism. Nature Human Behaviour, 4(1), 69-87. doi: 10.1038/s41562-019-0743-y pmid: 31591520
[63]	Zhou, Y., & Han, S. (2021). Neural dynamics of pain expression processing: Alpha-band synchronization to same-race pain but desynchronization to other-race pain. NeuroImage, 224, 117400.
[64]	Zhou, Y., Li, W., Gao, T., Pan, X., & Han, S. (2023). Neural representation of perceived race mediates the opposite relationship between subcomponents of self-construals and racial outgroup punishment. Cerebral Cortex, 33(13), 8759-8772.