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The Buzz: The Science of Morality

By amillikan on April 7, 2009.

The more moral you believe yourself to be, the less moral you may be inclined to act, according to a new study in Psychological Science. Psychologists evaluated the moral self-image of subject participants and then presented them with a variety of scenarios in which they were asked to donate money to charity and to choose between business practices that were either environment-friendly or cost-effective. The subjects who described themselves as being more ethical both donated less to charity and opted for cheaper, more harmful business practices compared to subjects who described themselves negatively. "Having established our persona as a do-gooder, we feel less impetus to bear the costs of future moral actions," explained ScienceBlogger Ed Yong.

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