Only moral agency, not instrumental competence, suppresses perceived patiency

Evidence

The moral typecasting hypothesis suggests that it is specifically perceptions of moral agency that reduce perceptions of moral patiency, however, so it is worth testing this link. To do so, we conducted two studies examining the relative influence of moral agency and general agency on perceptions of moral patiency. In Study 4a, we presented participants with Michael and Jeffrey (as in Study 3), and we described Jeffrey as more agentic in either a general or moral domain. We expected that people would see Jeffrey as relatively agentic in both conditions but only in the moral agency condition would there be an effect on moral patiency as indicated by a relative decrease in Jeffrey’s sensitivity to pain. In Study 4b, we drew the contrast even more sharply by portraying Michael as higher in general agency than Jeffrey, and Jeffrey as higher in (evil) moral agency than Michael. We then measured the relative perceptions of the moral patiency of Michael and Jeffrey by assessing which of them is a more likely victim. It was predicted that Jeffrey’s greater moral agency would lead him to be perceived less of a patient than the generally agentic Michael. — Kurt Gray and Daniel M. Wegner, Moral Typecasting, 99

The effects of perceived agency on moral patiency were specific to the moral domain, however, as variations in general instrumental agency did not influence perceived patiency (Studies 4a and 4b). … The contrariety of moral agency and patiency leads to the surprising finding that people are more willing to assign pain to good moral agents and to deprive them of pleasure than they are to deliver these harmful penalties to moral patients or to neutral targets (Study 7). — Kurt Gray and Daniel M. Wegner, Moral Typecasting, 147

Categorization

• XREF: Directly the template the reader seeks: the exact paradigm for isolating a DOMAIN-specific recategorization effect on perceived moral status. Compare with recategorizing ‘religious’ vs ‘ideological’ targets. — connects to: Perceived moral agency and perceived moral patiency vary inversely across targets — Kurt Gray and Daniel M. Wegner, Moral Typecasting: Divergent…, 39; Moral agency specifically, not general agency, reduces perceived moral patiency.; Perceiving someone as a moral agent reduces perceived moral patiency. — Kurt Gray and Daniel M. Wegner, Moral Typecasting: Divergent…, 1 (+7 more)
• QUESTION: The within-participant paired-target design (Michael vs Jeffrey) with matched domain-crossed descriptions is a reusable template. Study 4b’s ‘evil moral agency’ contrast is worth mining.
• corroborated: 3 independent passages support this claim — Kurt Gray and Daniel M. Wegner, Moral Typecasting: Divergent…, 99; Kurt Gray and Daniel M. Wegner, Moral Typecasting: Divergent…, 147