Degree Type
Honors Capstone Project
Date of Submission
Spring 5-1-2007
Capstone Advisor
Dr. Larry Lewandowski
Honors Reader
Dr. Brian Martens
Capstone Major
Psychology
Capstone College
Arts and Science
Audio/Visual Component
no
Capstone Prize Winner
no
Won Capstone Funding
no
Honors Categories
Social Sciences
Subject Categories
Other Psychology | Psychology | Social Psychology
Abstract
With regard to moral judgments. Lawrence Kohlberg claimed that reason and logic lead to answers about right and wrong. By contrast, Jonathan Haidt proposed an “emotivist” theory of morality in which feelings take center stage. I tested Haidt’s theory of moral judgment by showing 59 college undergraduate participants an abortion video while instructing them to increase, decrease, or make no attempt to change their level of emotion during the video. I found that the video succeeded at both increasing negative emotions (particularly disgust) and changing abortion attitudes to a more pro-life stance. Furthermore, the moral views of participants asked to down-regulate emotions by viewing the video analytically were less affected by the video. Implications and methodological problems are discussed.
Recommended Citation
Nydick, Steven, "Moral Emotion Regulation: The Case of Abortion Attitudes" (2007). Honors Capstone Projects - All. 586.
https://surface.syr.edu/honors_capstone/586
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.
