Conventions and morals—less distinct than you think: The unacknowledged role of effective consent

An influential account of moral judgment suggests there are two distinctive domains: that of conventional wrongs (a breach of social norms that can be changed/“modified” by an authority figure) and moral wrongs (that are viewed as breaching “natural law” and cannot be “modified”). However, pertinent tests conflate behaviors' content (for instance, theft vs. rudeness) with victims' proper consent. Initial studies suggest that this (victims' consent) is integral to the process whereby conventional wrongs are modified or de‐wronged; we then demonstrate that this process also applies in the moral domain. The two “domains”, thus, appear far more alike than is claimed.