The Effects of Social Distance and Gender on Moral Decisions and Judgments

Abstract: In morality, social distance should influence judgments and decisions. Singer et al.’s (2019) Everyday Moral Conflict Situations scale was created to assess altruistic versus egoistic choices in everyday moral contexts depending on social distance manipulated at the item level. Via a reanalysis of their data, we found an unreported interaction effect between social distance and gender on behavioral choices. We conducted a conceptual replication (Part 1) and extended previous research by empirically assessing the link between altruism and morality (Part 2). This pre-registered study ( N = 299) confirmed the gender-by-social distance interaction, with a stronger social distance effect for males and for egoistic behaviors. Furthermore, behavioral choices were linked to moral judgments of wrongness. Limitations and future directions are discussed.