People make moral decisions with a focus either on the morality of their actions (for example, killing one person) or on the value of the consequences of such actions (for example, saving the lives of five people). The first type of morality is called “deontological”, the second type is called “consequentialist”. Deontological morality can take extreme, uncompromising forms when the decision maker is unwilling to violate a particular norm irrespective of the consequences of such a violation. Research (Baron & Spranca, 1997; Tetlock, 2003) on “protected” or “sacred” values has characterized these uncompromising forms of deontological morality as irrational. For example, the prohibition against killing innocent people under any circumstances might block the sacrifice of one victim in order to save many lives. In the studies on sacred or protected values, consequentialism is the rational standard of comparison against which deontological decisions are compared. In this thesis we suggest that consequentialist moral decisions can also take uncompromising forms that can be as irrational as uncompromising deontological decisions. Consequentialist decision makers have limited access to information when forecasting the outcomes Resumen 14 of their decisions. When calculating the payoff of a course of action, decision makers should make a precise estimate of the actual moral and physical costs of the chosen action as well as a precise estimate of the probability of the actual occurrence of the intended goal. Psychological distance gives rise to an abstract representation of actions that makes goals more prominent and can help us ignore the actions´ immediate harmful effects. Our main hypothesis is that psychological distance promotes a mindset in which decision makers are less prone to make such precise estimates of the cost of the action and probability of the goal. In this way, consequentialist decisions become riskier and crueler. In other words, psychological distance should be a main predictor of uncompromising consequentialism. We tested and confirmed this hypothesis through seven experiments. In Experiments 1, 2 and 4, psychological distance increased the choices of riskier, potentially ineffective consequentialist courses of action. In Experiments 3, 5 and 6 participants were willing to subscribe alternative, radical “solutions” that seriously challenged strong moral normative intuitions (for example, the prohibition against killing your loved ones) in pursuit of an extremely abstract, absurdly idealized, object Resumen 15 of endeavor (to restore justice in the world). Finally, Experiment 7 confirmed an additional important effect of an abstract mindset: decision makers’ higher moral certitude and satisfaction. In our view, these findings will help us to understand (add to our understanding of) the dynamics of moral decision-making in those settings in which authorities and experts make decisions. While some professional advice recommends that decision-makers maintain distance from their emotions, our findings suggest that psychological distance can prompt potentially cruel and ineffective decisions that ignore the key costs of some consequentialist courses of action.

Tesis doctoral inédita leída en la Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Facultad de Psicología, Departamento de Psicología Social y Metodología. Fecha de lectura: 28 de marzo de 2014