NCT06735989

Moral Reasoning Intervention on Moral Justification Abilities

Effects of a Moral Reasoning Intervention on Moral Justification Abilities

• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 86 (actual)
• Sponsor: IRCCS San Raffaele · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 18 Years – 26 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Accepted

Summary

The primary aim of this study is to evaluate the short (immediate) and mid-term (one month) impact of moral (vs non-moral) reasoning interventions on the moral justification abilities in non-expert subjects. Such an impact will be assessed by observing quantitative changes (on 1 to 4 points scale) of qualitative variables in the moral justification expressed by the subjects.

Detailed description

The aim of this study is to test wether a single intervention on moral reasoning can have short and/or mid-term effects on the justification of moral judgements about a problematic moral case. Focusing on justification allows to assess reasonable improvement by referring to a procedural standard, that is, without assuming any substantive normative view; namely, without evaluating a "betterment" on the basis of the content of moral judgements, but rather on the satisfaction of formal, procedural conditions in their justification. Our standard for a good moral justification consists in a set of procedural features, such as logical, empirical, and conceptual competence, openness to revision, sympathetic imagination, and bias avoidance. Once enrolled, participants will be randomized through random.org software in the two experimental groups: 1) the moral and 2) the non-moral condition. Allocation concealment will be carried out through closed and opaque mails by a blind operator. Subjects will undergo a neuropsychological assessment and a (optional) task-based fMRI at study entry. Furthermore, during the day of the intervention (seminar: moral or logical reasoning), participants will undergo a pre-test (before the intervention) and a post-test (after the intervention) on a morally problematic case. The same test will be repeated by all participants one month after the intervention.

Conditions

• Moral Development
• Moral Dilemma
• Healthy Controls
• Moral Justification

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
OTHER	Lecture on moral reasoning	One and a half-hour long lecture on moral justification and moral reasoning
OTHER	Lecture on logical reasoning	One and a half-hour long lecture on logical and argumentative principles

Timeline

• Start date: 2022-11-18
• Primary completion: 2024-02-19
• Completion: 2025-10-13
• First posted: 2024-12-16
• Last updated: 2025-12-23

Locations

1 site across 1 country: Italy