ABSTRACT

Morality is built upon individualizing (i.e. care, fairness) and binding (i.e. loyalty, authority, and purity) moral foundations, which are the systems that help people to make moral decisions and behave accordingly. Past research has found that moral foundations are related to past unethical behaviors, but we are the first to test them among people in prison. Specifically, we investigated individual differences in moral foundations in men and women in prison (N = 382) relative to Poles with no criminal record (N = 382), who were matched to the prisoner sample by sex and age. We showed that prisoners care about moral foundations, but just with a different intensity than people from the general population. We found that prisoners had lower individualizing moral foundations and higher binding moral foundations than participants from the general population. Violent prisoners had lower levels of care and purity than non-violent prisoners. Regarding sex differences, women scored higher in individualizing moral foundations than men, both among prisoners and non-prisoners. Lastly, women in prison scored higher in binding moral foundations than men in prison. Our study adds to the discussion of individual differences in moral foundations, which might help prevent crimes and enable the resocialization process.

摘要

道德建立在个性化（即关怀、公平）和约束性（即忠诚、权威和纯洁）道德基础之上，这些道德基础是帮助人们做出道德决定并采取相应行动的系统。过去的研究发现，道德基础与过去的不道德行为有关，但我们是第一个在监狱里的人中进行测试的人。具体来说，我们调查了监狱中男性和女性 ( N  = 382) 相对于没有犯罪记录的波兰人 ( N = 382），他们与囚犯样本的性别和年龄相匹配。我们表明，囚犯关心道德基础，但程度与普通人不同。我们发现，与普通人群相比，囚犯的个体化道德基础较低，而约束性道德基础较高。暴力囚犯的关心程度和纯洁程度低于非暴力囚犯。关于性别差异，无论是囚犯还是非囚犯，女性在个体化道德基础方面的得分均高于男性。最后，监狱中的女性在约束道德基础方面的得分高于监狱中的男性。我们的研究增加了对道德基础个体差异的讨论，这可能有助于预防犯罪并促进重新社会化进程。