Skip to Main Content
HBS Home
  • About
  • Academic Programs
  • Alumni
  • Faculty & Research
  • Baker Library
  • Giving
  • Harvard Business Review
  • Initiatives
  • News
  • Recruit
  • Map / Directions
Faculty & Research
  • Faculty
  • Research
  • Featured Topics
  • Academic Units
  • …→
  • Harvard Business School→
  • Faculty & Research→
Publications
Publications
  • February 2020
  • Article
  • Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

Being 'Good' or 'Good Enough': Prosocial Risk and the Structure of Moral Self-regard

By: Julian Zlatev, Daniella M. Kupor, Kristin Laurin and Dale T. Miller
  • Format:Print
ShareBar

Abstract

The motivation to feel moral powerfully guides people’s prosocial behavior. We propose that people’s efforts to preserve their moral self-regard conform to a moral threshold model. This model predicts that people are primarily concerned with whether their prosocial behavior legitimates the claim that they have acted morally, a claim that often diverges from whether their behavior is in the best interests of the recipient. Specifically, it predicts that for people to feel moral following a prosocial decision, that decision need not have promised the greatest benefit for the recipient but only one larger than at least one other available outcome. Moreover, this model predicts that once people produce a benefit that exceeds this threshold, their moral self-regard is relatively insensitive to the magnitude of benefit that they produce. In six studies, we test this moral threshold model by examining people’s prosocial risk decisions. We find that, compared with risky egoistic decisions, people systematically avoid making risky prosocial decisions that carry the possibility of producing the worst possible outcome in a choice set—even when this means avoiding a decision that is objectively superior. We further find that this aversion to producing the worst possible prosocial outcome leads people’s prosocial (vs. egoistic) risk decisions to be less sensitive to those decisions’ maximum possible benefit. We highlight theoretical and practical implications of these findings, including the detrimental consequence that people’s desire to protect their moral self-regard can have on the amount of good that they produce.

Keywords

Prosocial Behavior; Moral Sensibility; Decision Making; Risk and Uncertainty; Behavior; Perception

Citation

Zlatev, Julian, Daniella M. Kupor, Kristin Laurin, and Dale T. Miller. "Being 'Good' or 'Good Enough': Prosocial Risk and the Structure of Moral Self-regard." Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 118, no. 2 (February 2020): 242–253.
  • Find it at Harvard
  • Purchase

About The Author

Julian J. Zlatev

Negotiation, Organizations & Markets
→More Publications

More from the Authors

    • March 2023
    • Faculty Research

    Río Curicó Teaching Note: Video Short I

    By: Kathleen L. McGinn and Julian Zlatev
    • February 2023
    • Faculty Research

    SIMmersion: Simulating Crucial Conversations

    By: Alison Wood Brooks and Julian Zlatev
    • 2023
    • Faculty Research

    Sending Signals: Strategic Displays of Warmth and Competence

    By: Bushra S. Guenoun and Julian J. Zlatev
More from the Authors
  • Río Curicó Teaching Note: Video Short I By: Kathleen L. McGinn and Julian Zlatev
  • SIMmersion: Simulating Crucial Conversations By: Alison Wood Brooks and Julian Zlatev
  • Sending Signals: Strategic Displays of Warmth and Competence By: Bushra S. Guenoun and Julian J. Zlatev
ǁ
Campus Map
Harvard Business School
Soldiers Field
Boston, MA 02163
→Map & Directions
→More Contact Information
  • Make a Gift
  • Site Map
  • Jobs
  • Harvard University
  • Trademarks
  • Policies
  • Accessibility
  • Digital Accessibility
Copyright © President & Fellows of Harvard College