Fatphobia in sacrificial moral decision-making dilemmas: Evidence from three experimental studies

Sacrificial moral dilemmas such as the Trolley problem have encouraged intense philosophical debate, and moral psychologists have been interested in studying how individuals come to make such moral decisions. Interestingly, in the original formulations of some of these dilemmas, there were some fatphobic themes. This prompts the question if being primed with these dilemmas induces fatphobic responses. We approached this question with three studies. In the first study, we assessed if describing a person as “fat” increases the likelihood that a subject would sacrifice that person to save five. In the second study, we assessed if that prejudice holds across other classical versions of sacrificial dilemmas. In the third study, we assessed if priming subjects with such scenarios has an effect on explicit fatphobic attitudes as measured by a validated and reliable scale. Results came out showing that describing a person as “fat” in a sacrificial scenario does increase the probability that they would be sacrificed to save five others. However, this only occurs in some versions of sacrificial dilemmas. Priming participants with sacrificial dilemmas has no effect on explicit fatphobic attitudes. Fatphobia significantly influences moral decision-making. While quick, instinctive actions amplify fatphobic biases, more abstract decision-making processes mitigate their impact, underscoring the need to address societal biases for fair moral judgment.