An affective approach to moral motivation

Details

Serval ID
serval:BIB_0B78295AD161
Type
Article: article from journal or magazin.
Collection
Publications
Institution
Title
An affective approach to moral motivation
Journal
Journal of Cognitive Science
Author(s)
Clavien C.
ISSN
0364-0213
Publication state
Published
Issued date
2010
Peer-reviewed
Oui
Volume
11
Number
2
Pages
129-160
Language
english
Abstract
Over the last few years, there has been a surge of work in a new field called "moral psychology", which uses experimental methods to test the psychological processes underlying human moral activity. In this paper, I shall follow this line of approach with the aim of working out a model of how people form value judgements and how they are motivated to act morally. I call this model an "affective picture": 'picture' because it remains strictly at the descriptive level and 'affective' because it has an important role for affects and emotions. This affective picture is grounded on a number of plausible and empirically supported hypotheses. The main idea is that we should distinguish between various kinds of value judgements by focusing on the sort of state of mind people find themselves in while uttering a judgement. "Reasoned judgements" are products of rational considerations and are based on preliminary acceptance of norms and values. On the contrary, "basic value judgements" are affective, primitive and non-reflective ways of assessing the world. As we shall see, this analysis has some consequences for the traditional internalism-externalism debate in philosophy; it highlights the fact that motivation is primarily linked to "basic value judgements" and that the judgements we openly defend might not have a particular effect on our actions, unless we are inclined to have an emotional attitude that conforms to them.
Keywords
affect, emotion, emotional reaction, externalism, internalism, moral judgement, motivation
Create date
18/01/2011 9:22
Last modification date
20/08/2019 12:33
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