title: Beyond "utilitarianism": maximizing the clinical impact of moral judgment research.
abstract: The use of hypothetical moral dilemmas--which pit utilitarian considerations of welfare maximization against emotionally aversive "personal" harms--has become a widespread approach for studying the neuropsychological correlates of moral judgment in healthy subjects, as well as in clinical populations with social, cognitive, and affective deficits. In this article, we propose that a refinement of the standard stimulus set could provide an opportunity to more precisely identify the psychological factors underlying performance on this task, and thereby enhance the utility of this paradigm for clinical research. To test this proposal, we performed a re-analysis of previously published moral judgment data from two clinical populations: neurological patients with prefrontal brain damage and psychopathic criminals. The results provide intriguing preliminary support for further development of this assessment paradigm.
authors.affiliation: a Department of Philosophy , Universidad Nacional de Colombia , Bogota , Colombia.
authors.forename: Alejandro
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Rosas
authors.forename: Michael
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Koenigs
mesh_terms: D000987:Antisocial Personality Disorder / Q000523:psychology; D001930:Brain Injuries / Q000523:psychology; D057237:Criminals / Q000523:psychology; D004644:Emotions; D006801:Humans; D007600:Judgment; D009014:Morals; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D017397:Prefrontal Cortex / Q000293:injuries
keywords: Moral judgment; Neuropsychology; Prefrontal cortex; Psychopathy; Social cognition