Counterfactual thinking in moral judgment: an experimental study.

ABSTRACT: Counterfactual thinking is thinking about a past that did not happen. This is often the case in "if only…" situations, where we wish something had or had not happened. To make a choice in a moral decision-making situation is particularly hard and, therefore, may be often associated with the imagination of a different outcome. The main aim of the present study is to investigate counterfactual thinking in the context of moral reasoning. We used a modified version of Greene's moral dilemmas test, studying both the time needed to provide a counterfactual in the first and third person and the type of given response (in context-out of context) in a sample of 90 healthy subjects. We found a longer response time for personal vs. impersonal moral dilemmas. This effect was enhanced in the first pers

SUBMITTER: Migliore S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4033199 | biostudies-literature | 2014

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature