The Character Curve: How Act Severity Affects Judgments of Moral Character (2016)

Undergraduates: Hanne Schrickx, Neil Hester

Faculty Advisor: Kurt Gray
Department: Psychology & Neuroscience

---

This thesis examined the relationship between the severity of an immoral act and the subsequent character judgment on the person performing the act. We predicted that while immoral acts are judged linearly as they become progressively more severe, the subsequent character judgments would increase in steps from neutral to bad to evil. We explored this relationship with three studies: a correlational study between judgments of act and character, an experimental study that manipulated the severity of different categories of immoral acts, and a study that asked participants to predict the someone's future actions based on a past action. (Data collection still in progress.)