Sunday, April 25, 2010

Goodists - those who view themselves as Moral Beings

JPost

Psychologists Nina Mazar and Chen-Bo Zhong of Toronto University recently reported a startling discovery in the journal Psychological Science: those who purchased a “morally virtuous” product, like organic baby food, were less likely to be charitable and more likely to lie and steal than those who purchased conventional products.

The Guardian summarized the findings: “[T]hose . . . who bought green products appeared less willing to share with others a set amount of money than those who bought conventional products. When the green consumers were given the chance to boost their money by cheating on a computer game and then given the opportunity to lie about it – in other words, steal – they did, while the conventional consumers did not.”  Those findings confirmed previous observations of patterns of “moral balancing,” whereby people who have proven their credentials as moral people in one area allow themselves to stray in other areas. Apparently, relatively minor acts that confer some sort of “moral halo” have the effect of licensing subsequent asocial and unethical behavior.[...]


7 comments:

  1. Or, that people who define their morality on a global and political level often neglect it in one-to-one exchanges.

    I find it more likely to be the issue in more of the cases in the test than "moral balancing".

    -micha

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  2. It confirms something I have noticed in my life.

    The vast majority of truly kind and generous people I have met could be labeled gruff and no nonsense, whereas the vast majority of lowlifes attempt to exude an aura of kindness and wisdom.

    I found that with rabbonim as well. Those who were good people had a spark of anger for evil in their midst. The politicians would act like it wasn't so bad and we should be above being hurt.

    Tropper could act smooth and pretend to be holy, but he could not control his hatred at times. You could claim that this makes him the exception. But to me, it just shows that he wasn't good at what he did, which is why he was caught. He has very little self control. With more control he could have become today's Meyer Lansky.

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  3. This "moral balancing" is perhaps the reason why so many otherwise frum people employ illegal immigrants at dumping fees, cheat taxes, steal, etc and sometimes pass the money gained by all these illegal activities to jewish welfare funds, schools, etc...

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  4. Too thoughtful for NewsApril 26, 2010 at 2:35 AM

    Nice catch, Micha. But hardly difficult, given how full of holes Rosenblum's arguments typically are. I personally find him so shamelessly ideological as to be not worth reading.

    While no Obama fan myself, I can't help but wonder what it is exactly, that makes his measures "diktat" but Bush's just good policy? Strike that- citing evidence, when it occurs in every other sentence, is superfluous.

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  5. Here's the actual article:
    http://www.rotman.utoronto.ca/newthinking/greenproducts.pdf

    I'm not sure if the study is really such a chiddush.

    The core point of the study is that there is distinction between thinking about virtuousness (viewing a shopping website with envrionmentally friendly goods) vs. acting on the virtuous thoughts (actually buying those products), in how the subject's general sense of morality is affected.

    People who merely viewed the website w/o buying ended up *more* virtuous than controls, whereas people who actually bought items became *less* virtuous than controls.

    Micha - The study does not address global vs. one-to-one virtuous acts. It would, however, be intersting to see if these two different types of virtuous acts have differenct effects.

    I don't know if one can make any sweeping generalizations about the "Goodists", in particular, based on this study. As J. Rosemblum himself implies, the same study can be used to paint any idealistic group in a negative light.

    I think another intersting study would be the long term effects of regular altruistic/ virtuous behavior. For example, can people train themselves to be more resistant to the "moral balancing" effect by doing more virtuous acts regularly, or will such behavior entrench a person's self-image as moral beings and make their overall moral actions worse?

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  6. Rosenblum reportedly receives money from vested interests. He never denied it, and his funding sources are conveniently secret. And, funny thing, he continually and shamelessly promotes their cause.

    Reading him for objective thought is kind of like reading 'research' paid for by Phillip Morris.

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  7. http://legaltimes.typepad.com/files/ag-usatty-letter-to-judge-reade.pdf

    Nat Lewin has been running around getting as many high profile signatures as he can to defend his client Sholom Rubashkin.

    Among these groysa knackers who signed (*even though they admit they don't really know the facts in the case), is former Deputy Attorney General Larry Thompson.

    What Thompson doesn't say to identify himself is that he is currently the chief counsel at Pepsico. Pepsico sells "Near East" brand rice with real chicken flavor under OU. Both the OU and Pepsico refuse to tell consumers if the chicken is from Rubashkin (for those makpid because of lax kashrus standards), claiming it is a "trade secret".

    Rubashkin was known to sell at a steep discount, undercutting the competition at prices only possible because he was cutting corners. Is this an attempt by Pepsico to protect their cheap supply of supposedly kosher chicken?

    *The former DOJ officials said in their letter that they have read the government and defense sentencing memos but have not made an “independent effort to investigate the accuracy of the factual statements” in the court papers.

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