Moral disengagement: empirical evidence and alternative interpretations

Vitor Teixeira Institute of Criminology University of Cambridge

vert2@cam.ac.uk

Abstract: The following article discusses the theoretical and empirical arguments for and against cross-cultural universalism of moral disengagement. First, I will introduce moral disengagement theory, presenting the different mechanisms of moral disengagement, alongside empirical evidence supporting the claimed universality of moral disengagement; second, using the same empirical studies on intimate partner violence, I shall argue for a different analysis of the results, criticizing some of the premises of moral disengagement and suggest alternative uses of mechanisms of moral disengagement; and in conclusion, future lines of research are proposed following the arguments put forward throughout the article. Keywords: moral disengagement; wife-beating; moral standards; violence; cultural norms. Moral disengagement 1. The theory Moral disengagement theory uses social cognitive theorys agentic perspective and the notion of self-efficacy to include moral agency (Bandura, 2002a). Under the latter theory, personal efficacy is the belief that one has the power to produce desired effects by ones action (p. 270). This belief affects not just individual action, but also affects the actions of an entire group with shared beliefs in their collective efficacy: Peoples shared beliefs in their collective efficacy influence the type of futures they seek to achieve through collective effort; how well they use their resources; how much effort they put into their group endeavors; their staying power when collective efforts fail to produce quick results or meet forcible opposition; and their vulnerability to discouragement that can beset those taking on tough social problems. (p. 271) Moral standards are taken up throughout the socialization process and serve as guides and deterrents for conduct (Bandura, 1990, p.27). What conditions individual behaviour, however, are self-regulatory mechanisms abiding by the moral standards. These self-regulatory mechanisms prevent an individual from infringing their moral standards, which would otherwise provoke self-condemnation. Beliefs of self-efficacy control the conditioning power of selfregulatory mechanisms in the exercise of moral agency. However, a number of psychological 2

mechanisms may be used in order to selectively disengage oneself from moral conduct and allow for a behaviour which would otherwise bring self-condemnation (Bandura, 2002a). These mechanisms are responsible for personal conduct whereas moral standards act as the norms to be followed. Bandura (1990, 2002b) lists eight mechanisms of selective moral disengagement: moral justification; euphemistic language/labelling; advantageous comparison; displacement and diffusion of responsibility; disregard or distortion of the consequences; dehumanizing the victim; and attributing blame to the victim. In moral justification people justify their actions under a moral imperative so that morally contradicting behaviour becomes free of self-condemnation, or as Bandura puts it, [m]oral justifications sanctify the violent means (2002b, p. 103). Through the use euphemistic language one diminishes the perceived injuriousness of certain behaviour and diminishes personal responsibility. By the use of euphemisms one sanitises the language used in the perpetration of morally repulsive behaviour; another use of this mechanism is through the agentless passive voice, in which agency is placed on unidentified forces rather than in the individual actor (Bandura, 2002b). Advantageous comparison is used to diminish the perceived repulsiveness of certain immoral conduct by comparing it with a far more horrendous example. The higher the contrast between the example provided and the justified behaviour, the more benign ones own destructive conduct will appear (Bandura, 2002b, p. 105). Displacement and diffusion of responsibility both diminish the self-condemnation one feels in the course of immoral conduct, the first by attributing responsibility of the act to the authority figure who ordains that same act, and the latter by disseminating responsibility of the act to the rest of the group who decides and shares the labour in the perpetration of the act (Bandura, 1990, 2002b) Division of labour can also have the effect of professionalizing the action while lessening the responsibility for the entire act (Osofsky, et al., 2005). Disregard or distortion of consequences for ones immoral actions diminishes the self-condemnation one feels in the face of the harm caused. As Bandura puts it, [t]he further removed individuals are from the destructive end results, the weaker is the restraining power of injurious effects (Bandura, 2002b, p. 108). By dehumanising the victim, one is less considerate for their suffering by feeling less empathy for them. Whilst one categorizes others as humans, this activates empathetic reactions through perceived similarities (Bandura, 2002b, p. 108), whereas removing this characteristic from ones victims prevents this empathetic reaction and allows for the perpetration of inhumanities. 3

Attributing blame to the victims for your actions serves the same purpose as dehumanisation. Ones actions are not to blame, nor does one feel self-condemnation but legitimated in ones actions when there is a perceived threat or provocation from another individual (Bandura, 1990, 2002b). These mechanisms allow for an individual to morally disengage from conduct that is against his own moral standards, and it is through the selective use of these mechanisms that individuals are able to perform inhumanities (Bandura, 1999; Ososfsky, et al., 2005). Moreover, their self-exonerating power is greater when combined with each other. These mechanisms of moral disengagement also are, as Bandura argues, a universal characteristic of human agency (2002a). The behavioural changes these mechanisms enable, however, do not occur abruptly, or as Bandura states, the change is achieved by progressive disengagement of self-censure (2002, p. 110). 2. The evidence Studies on military training (Elizur & Yishay-Krien, 2009), terrorism training (Hafez, 2006, 2007), and wife beating (Haj-Yahia, 1997; Haj-Yahia & de Zoysa, 2007; Haj-Yahia & Uysal, 2008; Jeejebhoy, 1998; Rani, et al., 2004; Rani & Bonu, 2009; Sakalli, 2001) attest to the use of different mechanisms to justify acts of violence which are morally condemnable. On the case of military training, Elizur and Yishay-Krien (2009) report how Israeli soldiers began dehumanising Arabs through field practices and how the orders demanding acts of violence against Arabs from superior officers in group exercises helped in this process. Violence was justified, glorified, and, for those unwilling to perform violent acts, advantageously compared to other types of violent acts. One of the soldiers refers to the breaking down into the customs of soldier life: My limit broke down when I shot into a school. There was a child there he looked like he was throwing something, maybe a glass bottle. I didnt want to hit him point blank and he ran away with half his leg shot off. You get it? But everybody told me that it was nonsense to take this to heart, that others did so much worse things. So the limit just disappeared. Theres no limit anymore. Get it? (F-1 in Elizur & Yishay-Krien, 2009)

Another refers to the whole process as a lengthy progression in violent deeds: My own limit didnt break down all at once, but in stages, Its a step by step process. You dont feel so much at each stage, and then there is another step and another step until you reach your limit. It is so similar to the previous step. In the first step, it was a slap. In the second, it was a kick. The third was (F-3 in Elizur & Yishay-Krien, 2009) Military campaigns are equally justified through moral disengagement mechanisms employed by governments onto their citizens: Naturally the common people dont want war; neither in Russia, nor in England, nor in America, nor in Germany. That is understood. But after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country. - Hermann Gering, during the Nuremberg Trials, 1946. In the case of terrorism indoctrination, Hafez (2006) demonstrates how moral justification, what he states as a primary mechanism for rationalizing Palestinian suicide attacks (p. 299), receives a divine position in the literal interpretation in Qurans verses. The acts of suicide bombers are not framed as suicides, something seen as an act of weak minded individuals, but as acts of martyrdom against others portrayed as an arrogant people that are untrustworthy and inherently deceitful, as evinced by how they persecuted the Prophets of God (p. 305). The narratives of jihadists captures how justified and legitimate they feel in their actions after a process of indoctrination through the use of several mechanisms of moral disengagement (see Hafez, 2007). As for wife beating, several studies showed that, for instance, patriarchal ideology (HajYahia & Uysal, 2008; Jejeebhoy, 1998; Rani, et al., 2004; Rani & Bonu, 2008; Sakalli, 2001), which enforces male dominance and subordinate females to degeneratory roles (Sakalli, 2001), 5

and the belief on the benefits of wife beating to women (Haj-Yahia & Uysal, 2008) were often related to the belief that wife beating is justified, even if only under certain conditions. An alternative interpretation Moral disengagement theory appears to presume that everyone believes in the same code of conduct and engages in moral disengagement to allow themselves to act immorally under certain circumstances. Is it not equally plausible that people adhere to different codes of conduct altogether, even though some systems of norms and values may be related to others (Moran, 2006), and that moral disengagement allows them to minimize their penalty when their deviant actions are made public? Moral standards are acquired throughout an individuals socialization, and through mechanisms of moral disengagement one can behave against those standards without suffering self-condemnation (Bandura, 2002b). However, if one has socialized different moral standards, because one is part of a different culture, the mechanisms may no longer function solely to prevent self-condemnation. Both these hypothesis are considered below. 1. Different moral standards? One incorporates a code of conduct appropriate for the community/social network where one was socialized (Teixeira, forthcoming), and moral disengagement gives the opportunity to engage with the rest of society and explain ones behaviour in terms of their understanding. If wife beating is believed to bring obedience under one cultural group, justifying for that behaviour to the society at large would require one to justify that action in terms that they will understand and condone, e.g., wife beating due to infidelity. The central question here is: what if different cultures foster different moral standards? The studies on wife-beating referred above presented an interesting result: in all samples, having higher education was negatively associated with beliefs and/or attitudes which condoned wife beating, that is, less educated individuals more often expressed wife beating favourably. In the increasing globalisation and speedy exchange of information (Bandura, 2002a), values from different cultures are exchanged and enmeshed. Education, as it becomes ever more specialized, it becomes more westernized as well (Godelier, 1991), and apparently equally westernising 6

(Demerath, 2000). Those attaining higher levels of education are also being presented to western values. Does this inversely mean that a lower education level represents individuals more embedded in a traditional, non-Western culture? Are the high results condoning wife beating mirroring this traditional, non-Western culture? 1.1 A past of violence? Another interesting finding from the wife beating studies mentioned is that having experienced or witnessed violence in the household throughout childhood and adolescence was positively correlated to attitudes condoning of wife beating. A previous experience of violence is ubiquitous cross-culturally in individual violent outcomes (Ember & Ember, 1994). One often overlooked theory on the genesis of violence argues that a specific set of social experiences is mandatory in the creation of dangerous violent criminals (Athens, 1992). Of all the violent criminals interviewed throughout his extensive ethnographic fieldwork, Athens found a past of violence in all of them (Athens, 1992). On his previous work, he had categorized violent acts and actors, and in all of the accounts of violent performances the perpetrators felt justified in their conduct (Athens, 1997). On their turn, violent performances serve to establish the dominance hierarchy within a community (Athens, 1998, 2005; Teixeira, forthcoming), something that is already pointed by other authors as a possible evolutionary use of violence (Buss & Shackelford, 1997; Duntley & Shackelford, 2008; Eisner, 2009). Dutton and Golants profile of cyclical spouse batterers points to the effect of parental abuse/harsh physical discipline early in life on the development of this type of spouse abuser (1995), and a similar factor of early violence experience is noted in psychological development of perpetrators of genocide (Baum, 2008). 1.2 Mutability of agents? One small note to add on this argument is on the mutability of individuals throughout the life course. Since the moral standards appear to be the same to everyone, and these do not change over the life-course (hence placing the moral standards as the universal characteristic of all humankind), script changes as the ones Maruna (2002) has shown in people desisting from crime are unlikely to occur. Although, desistance of crime could still be accomplished done in the same

lengthy process using moral disengagement mechanisms to reshape the subjects behaviour into compliance with the moral standards? 2. Minimize punishment? We are social beings living in communities and individual actions must be accounted for when the values and norms of conduct are the same for everyone within that community. If a single individual acts in a way different from what is expected, he must justify his actions to the community in a way that they will understand and comprehend his action. Therefore, we morally disengage not just for us, but for the rest of the community. The different mechanisms of moral disengagement become, under these terms, post-hoc rationalizations made in terms that the community and society at large would comprehend and perceive as legitimate acts. When the different mechanisms of moral disengagement are not used for diminishing or preventing self-condemnation and, considering the previous point in which people adhere to different moral standards and that different cultures socialize different moral standards to their members, these mechanisms may diminish and prevent the punishment from the community owed to the perpetrator of illegal acts. Under this perspective, one activates mechanisms of moral disengagement to explain and justify the perfidious act to ones respective community, and the way this justification is provided is by using the arguments one has learned throughout socialization in that same community. That is to say that the mechanisms of moral disengagement used to explain the act are culturally biased. When the justification of the immoral act is culturally acceptable, the due sentence of the offender for that act is diminished or even waived. Conclusion The mechanisms of moral disengagement occur widely in several cultures, as the different studies mentioned attest. However, it is not yet clear whether there is an actual disengagement from the moral standard to prevent self-condemnation, or whether it is a post-hoc justification which minimizes penalty from the community by explaining a socially inappropriate or prohibited act in ways understandable by everyone, that is, framing the act in a context where it is culturally acceptable to engage in that manner. On the other hand, there are justifications universally accepted, as in the case of self-defence in murder cases. From all the legislations 8

consulted (Australia, Brazil, Bolvia, Canada, Macedonia, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain, US, and UK)1, in all cases the sentence for self-defence was less than the sentence for murder, ranging from complete dissolution of guilt in Bolvia to life sentence in Singapore (as opposed to mandatory death for those found guilt of murder in the latter case). An interesting future line of research, following the arguments exposed insofar, is to test the self-worth obtained on individuals who condone of wife beating. If moral standards indeed differ from culture to culture, then the behaviours through which one enacts self-efficacy, thus feeling self-worth (Osofsky, et al., 2005), are also different. One, who beats his wife out of inappropriate behaviour from her part, should also feel some sense of self-worth for performing a task which is socially acceptable and even demanded from his fellow community members. Otherwise, can it be assumed that condoning wife beating under certain conditions is the result of the lengthy process of moral disengagement, a process which is culturally induced while maintaining universal moral standards? Another similar line of research focuses on military personnel and on the behaviours that produce self-worth before and after indoctrination, comparing as well their past experiences of violence. According to the wife beating studies, those who had experienced violence before were more likely to condone of wife beating than those who had not experienced violence. The underlying question here is: Does moral disengagement change their beliefs or just the scripts enabling self-condemning acts to occur free of guilt under the conditions they have been indoctrinated? In his work, Quintais (2000a, 2000b) refers that post-traumatic stress disorder patients often are led to a reconstruction of the traumatic events which led them to a mental break down. As for the example of humanizing victims to deter violent actions against them (Bandura, 2002b), a tentative use of the mechanism responsible for distorting the consequences of ones immoral actions could be used in the benefit of PTSD patients. Their condition is the effect an event for which they had not been prepared for during their socialization (Teixeira, forthcoming) and, through a reconstruction of their personal history in group therapy, they become capable of coping with those traumatic experiences (Quintais, 2000a, 2000b). The question of universalism of moral disengagement remains unclear. Moral standards may differ from culture to culture, thus changing the function of the different mechanisms of
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moral disengagement. Under this perspective the notion of self-condemnation on morally reprehensible behaviours loses its strength since those behaviours, such as wife beating, are no longer morally reprehensible for those groups whose notion of self-efficacy demands this type of action. Universals require behaviour already present in our evolutionary origins (Cartwright, 2000). From the original theory of moral disengagement, this appears more to be of a Western based ideology rather than one based on evolutionary behaviour. The liberal ideology of equal rights requires for people to morally disengage from certain actions. However, patriarchal ideologies are more imbedded in our collective history (Cartwright, 2000) than liberalism and equal rights. From the evidence provided, the mechanisms of moral disengagement seem to be widely applied, one could even tentatively say that they are universally applied, but their specific use may still vary cross-culturally.

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