The Relationship Between Moral Superiority Bias and Ethical Decision-Making Frameworks

A tendency for people to rate themselves as ‘more moral’ than the ‘average person’ – known as the Moral Superiority Bias (MSB) – is a common characteristic of members in extremist political groups, and thus may contribute to political and social hostility. Despite this, the factors underpinning individual differences in MSB are not yet known. Identifying links between MSB and more established bodies of literature in moral psychology, such as individual differences between people who make utilitarian vs. deontologically-guided ethical decisions, may provide further insight into MSB. Eighty-nine (19 male, 70 female) 1st-year Psychology students from [institution name redacted] completed measures of MSB and ethical decision-making style. Correlational analyses revealed that participants whose moral decision making was more strongly guided by utilitarian arguments exhibited lower levels of MSB. Participants who scored highly in deontological moral thinking did not display higher levels of MSB, but did show low self-ratings of moral character. The findings suggest that moral framework is not a relevant factor for understanding the MSB seen in extremist political groups. Other potential avenues of research towards building our understanding of MSB are discussed.