Influence of an autobiographical memory recollection on moral decision making.

Influence of an autobiographical memory recollection on moral decision making.

Sandra Andrasiunaite

2018

Research shows that emotional states are involved in moral reasoning and may affect
people’s decision-making processes (Achar, So, Agrawal, & Duhachek, 2016).
However, in recent research emotional states were shown to be easily influenced by
such factors as the language type. It was found that a stimulus presented in the native
language was perceived more emotionally when compared to stimuli presented in the
second language (Pavlenko, 2005). This difference in emotionality was called the
language effect (Puntoni, S., Langhe, & Van Osselaer, 2009). The relationship
between used language (native vs. second) and emotionality level is important as it
may provide potential applications in promoting beneficial decision making and
consequent behaviour. Many advertising campaigns already target emotions (i.e.
empathy, guilt, regret) in order to persuade people to act by their request (Lee,
Andrade, Palmer, 2013). Thus the focus of this research was to analyse the
relationship between emotional language processing (native vs. second language)
targeting guilt, empathy levels and how they influence the consequent behaviour (i.e.
helping). A multicultural sample of 126 bilingual adults, who all speak English, as a
second language, completed an online questionnaire, assessing self-reported guilt,
pro-social behaviour inclination, empathy and pro-social behaviour. Results showed
that no significant differences were found between two language groups, indicating
the lack of language effect in the present sample. Also, the results showed that high
levels of self-reported guilt were significantly and positively associated with high
levels of pro-social inclination and pro-social behaviour. Empathy was shown to have
the same association – high levels of empathy being associated with high levels of
pro-social inclination and pro-social behaviour. Lastly, further analysis found selfreported guilt as a predictor of pro-social behaviour and pro-social behaviour
inclination. Overall, this study contradicted the previous research on the language
effect, but at the same time, it supported the relationship between guilt and pro-social behaviour. Based on current findings and consideration of potential limitations, future
research could examine the emotional language processing and its’ influence on
behaviour by targeting specific two languages and presenting text adverts as an
emotional stimulus in order to control more variables and to increase applicability.

The language effect
emotional decision making
guilt
empathy
pro-social behaviour

Participants
Participants of this study were adults, who spoke English as a second language (N=
126, 58 males, 68 females) and ranged in age from 18 to 46. Originally there were
138 participants, but 12 were excluded from further analysis due to being the native
speakers of the English language and therefore not fitting the core requirement –
speaking English as a second language. Also 10 participants wrote the memory in
English instead of their native language, so they were diverted to the second language
condition before proceeding with the analysis. The whole sample of participants was
very diverse, which consisted of 25 different nationalities and 24 different native
languages (see Appendix D), the top four languages being - Lithuanian (40), Spanish
(14), German (13) and Polish (13). All participants signed an online consent form and
answered questions about their nationality, native language, country of residence, and
English language proficiency before proceeding with the questionnaire.
Materials
Self-reported guilt
Self-reported guilt was measured by asking participants to first – recall and describe a
memory in either their native or second language (i.e. English) and then to evaluate
how bad they feel about their recalled actions, how guilty they feel about those
actions and how much they regret them (Nelissen, 2012). All of the three questions
testing self-reported guilt were assessed by 6-point forced choice Likert scale from 1
(‘Very much’) to 6 (‘Not at all’). Before the start of analyses, the scale was reverse
scored from 1 (‘Not at all’) to 6 (‘Very much’) to ensure consistency with other
measures.
Pro-social behaviour
The pro-social behaviour was measured by asking participants, how many additional
questions they would be willing to answer after completing the survey. Participants
were informed that they are almost done with the survey. However, it was stated, that
it would be a great help to the researchers if participants could answer some
additional questions from a different survey. Participants were provided with a choice
to answer from zero to 10 questions, after completing the original survey.
Consequently, willingness to answer the higher number of questions was perceived as
an indication of higher pro-social behaviour.
Pro-social behaviour inclinations
Pro-social behaviour inclination was measured using a set of five moral dilemmas
from the research done by Zhang, Chen, Jiang, Xu, Wang, and Zhao (2017). This measure tested how much a person is inclined to display helping behaviour. The
answers to these moral dilemmas were assessed by a forced choice Likert scale from
1 (‘Strongly disagree’) to 6 (‘Strongly agree’), which was changed from the original
7-point Likert scale to ensure consistency with the measures of the present study.
Also, some moral dilemmas were adapted by changing mentioned currency from yens
to pounds in order to make dilemmas more relatable for mostly UK based
participants. A sample of the item measuring pro-social behaviour inclination is:
‘Your school’s foundation is raising money for children from poor areas. The money
will be used to buy textbooks and writing materials for the children. You have 100
pounds to spare. Are you willing to donate the money to the student?’
Empathy
Empathy was assessed by using The Short 3 Factor Version of Empathy Quotient
(Muncer & Ling, 2006). The empathy measure consisted of 15 items, with a choice of
answers assessed by a forced choice 6 point - Likert scale from 1 (‘Strongly
disagree’) to 6 (‘Strongly agree’). The original measure was provided with a 4 point
Likert scale (1-strongly disagree, 2- disagree, 3- agree, 4- strongly agree), but it was
changed for the current research into 6 points Likert scale in order to ensure
consistency with other measures and provide a wider range of answers. Seven items
(6, 7, 8, 9, 12, 13, 14) of this empathy measure were reverse scored before the start of
analysis to ensure its’ reliability and validity. A sample of the item measuring
empathy is: ‘I am quick to spot when someone in a group is feeling awkward or
uncomfortable.’
Procedure
This study received the ethical approval from the Psychology Department Research
Ethics Committee of Lancaster University.
The hypotheses, method and analyses of the current study were preregistered before
the collection of participants has started. The whole information about the study will
be available on the Open Science Framework page.
Participants were recruited using social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram
and in person, inviting people to complete the survey online. The survey was
distributed using an anonymous link, which directed to a Qualtrics page of the survey.
Participants were presented with an information sheet and the consent form and only
after signing it, they were allowed to proceed with the questionnaire. At first,
participants were asked to provide some general information about themselves such as
age, gender, nationality, English language proficiency and country of residence.
Participants were then randomly allocated to an experimental condition (native
language, second language). Then they were requested to recall a memory, when they
caused someone harm and felt bad about it. They were asked to recall and describe
this memory either in English or in their native language at random. Participants in
the native language condition were asked to recall the memory in their native
language. Participants in the second language condition were asked to recall the
memory in English. After providing the memory, participants were asked to evaluate
how bad, guilty and regretful they feel about their recalled actions. Afterwards, they
completed the measure of pro-social behavior, by indicating how many additional
questions they would be willing to answer after the current survey ends. The last part
of the survey consisted of five moral dilemmas assessing pro-social behaviour inclination (see Appendix A) and the measure of empathy (see Appendix B). Overall,
the survey took approximately 15 minutes to complete. At the end of the survey,
participants were presented with a debrief sheet, explaining the aims and the
importance of this research (see Appendix C).

Lancaster University

Data

Andrasiunaite2018

Ellie Ball

Open

None

English

Data

LA1 4YF

Dr Neil McLatchie

MSc

Social Psychology

126 Participants

Correlations
t-test
ANOVA
multiple regression