Beyond Hypotheticals: Moral Choices and Motivations in a Real-life Sacrificial Dilemma

Sacrificial dilemmas require individuals to decide whether or not to actively harm one person to save several others. Decisions are interpreted as reflecting "utilitarian" versus "deontological" moral concerns. Existing research relies almost exclusively on hypothetical dilemmas. We confronted 438 participants with a real-life dilemma involving (minor) physical harm. Participants decided whether to allow two confederates to receive a painful electroshock or shock a third confederate and provided motivations for their choice. We manipulated whether sacrificial harm required up-close personal action and had participants complete the dilemma twice. Results show responses to traditional hypothetical dilemmas predict real-life behavior but that up-close personal action did not affect what decision participants favored. Interestingly, 35% of participants altered their decision on the second iteration. A motivational analysis revealed diverse moral concerns besides those labeled as "utilitarian" or "deontological", and demonstrates that decisions to commit or refuse sacrificial harm can stem from similar moral motivations.