Moral Judgments and Social Stereotypes: Do the Age and Gender of the Perpetrator and the Victim Matter?. Issue 4 (May 2018)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Chu, Qiao; Grühn, Daniel
• Is Part Of: Social psychological & personality science. Volume 9:Issue 4(2018)
• Page Start: 426
• Page End: 434
• Publication Date: 2018-05
• Subjects: stereotype -- moral judgment -- benevolent ageism -- benevolent sexism -- gender; Personality -- Periodicals; Social psychology -- Periodicals; Electronic journals; 155.2
• DOI: 10.1177/1948550617711226
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1948-5506

Abstract

We investigated how moral judgments were influenced by (a) the age and gender of the moral perpetrator and victim, (b) the moral judge's benevolent ageism and benevolent sexism, and (c) the moral judge's gender. By systematically manipulating the age and gender of the perpetrators and victims in moral scenarios, participants in two studies made judgments about the moral transgressions. We found that (a) people made more negative judgments when the victims were old or female rather than young or male, (b) benevolent ageism influenced people's judgments about young versus old perpetrators, and (c) people had differential moral expectations of perpetrators who belonged to their same-gender group versus opposite-gender group. The findings suggest that age and gender stereotypes are so salient to bias people's moral judgments even when the transgression is undoubtedly intentional and hostile.