The Cognition of Severe Moral Failure: A Novel Approach to the Perception of Evil

Frontiers in Psychology

Aner Govrin¹ 

关键词: evil;    moral development;    prototype theory;    moral judgments;    cognitive bias;    perspective taking;   

DOI  :  10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00557

学科分类：心理学（综合）

来源: Frontiers

【 摘 要 】

I describe the perception of evil as a categorization judgment, based on a prototype, with extensive feedback loops and top-down influences. Based on the attachment approach to moral judgment (Govrin, 2014, 2018), I suggest that the perception of evil consists of four salient features: Extreme asymmetry between victim and perpetrator; a specific perceived attitude of the perpetrator toward the victim's vulnerability; the observer's inability to understand the perpetrator's perspective; and insuperable differences between the observer and perpetrator's judgment following the incident which shake the observer no less than the event itself. I then show that the perception of evil involves a cognitive bias: The observer is almost always mistaken in his attributions of a certain state of mind to the perpetrator. The philosophical and evolutionary significance of this bias is discussed as well as suggestions for future testing of the prototype model of evil.

【 授权许可】

CC BY