{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2025,12,11]],"date-time":"2025-12-11T05:19:51Z","timestamp":1765430391908,"version":"3.46.0"},"reference-count":33,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"12","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2025,12,8]],"date-time":"2025-12-08T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1765152000000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"DOI":"10.13039\/501100001809","name":"National\u00a0Natural\u00a0Science\u00a0Foundation\u00a0of\u00a0China","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","award":["31671160"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["31671160"]}],"id":[{"id":"10.13039\/501100001809","id-type":"DOI","asserted-by":"crossref"}]},{"name":"Major Project of National Social Science Foundation","award":["19ZDA363"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["19ZDA363"]}]}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Behavioral Sciences"],"abstract":"<jats:p>Background: While extensive research has examined the antecedents of utilitarian moral judgment, its subsequent social consequences remain less explored. Drawing on the moral reciprocal partner selection model and the moral intuition modular myopia hypothesis, this study investigates the impact of utilitarian moral judgment on bystander cooperation behavior and the moderating role of personal force. Objectives: This research aims to determine whether utilitarian moral judgments, compared to non-utilitarian ones, decrease bystander cooperation (Hypothesis 1), and whether this effect is more pronounced when the utilitarian judgment involves personal force (Hypothesis 2). Methods: Two progressive between-subjects experiments were conducted. Experiment 1 (N = 159) employed a single-factor design (utilitarian vs. non-utilitarian judgment) using a footbridge dilemma scenario and a trust task to measure cooperation. Experiment 2 (N = 346) utilized a 2 (judgment: utilitarian vs. non-utilitarian) \u00d7 2 (personal force: personal force vs. no personal force) factorial design, employing the same trust task. Results: In Experiment 1, bystanders invested significantly fewer tokens in the trust task after observing a utilitarian judgment compared to a non-utilitarian one. Experiment 2 revealed a significant main effect of moral judgment and a significant interaction between moral judgment and personal force. Simple effects analysis confirmed that the negative effect of utilitarian judgments on cooperation was stronger when personal force was involved. Conclusions: Utilitarian moral judgments reduce bystander cooperation compared to non-utilitarian judgments, and this reduction is more substantial when the judgment involves personal force. These findings highlight the interpersonal costs of utilitarian decision-making and underscore the importance of contextual features like personal force in understanding its social reception.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/bs15121699","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2025,12,8]],"date-time":"2025-12-08T15:30:07Z","timestamp":1765207807000},"page":"1699","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":0,"title":["The Effect of Moral Judgment on Bystander Cooperation Behavior: The Role of Personal Force"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"15","author":[{"given":"Xiaodan","family":"Xu","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Arts and Communication, Beijing Normal University, Beijing 100875, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-2931-5316","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Yidie","family":"Lai","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"State Key Laboratory of Cognitive Neuroscience and Learning, Beijing Normal University, Beijing 100875, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Juan","family":"Wang","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Psychology, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Beijing Forestry University, Beijing 100083, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-8344-6478","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Yang","family":"Liu","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Psychology, Shanghai Normal University, Shanghai 200234, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Ming","family":"Yu","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Arts and Communication, Beijing Normal University, Beijing 100875, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-0860-7547","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Feng","family":"Zhang","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Psychological Research and Counseling Center, Southwest Jiaotong University, Chengdu 610031, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Yan","family":"Xu","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Beijing Key Laboratory of Applied Experimental Psychology, National Demonstration Center for Experimental Psychology Education (Beijing Normal University), Faculty of Psychology, Beijing Normal University, Beijing 100875, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2025,12,8]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"586","DOI":"10.1037\/0278-6133.19.6.586","article-title":"Relationship of subjective and objective social status with psychological and physiological functioning: Preliminary data in healthy, White women","volume":"19","author":"Adler","year":"2000","journal-title":"Health Psychology"},{"key":"ref_2","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"880","DOI":"10.1038\/s41562-022-01319-5","article-title":"Situational factors shape moral judgements in the trolley dilemma in Eastern, Southern and Western countries in a culturally diverse sample","volume":"6","author":"Bago","year":"2022","journal-title":"Nature Human Behaviour"},{"key":"ref_3","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"33","DOI":"10.1016\/j.copsyc.2015.07.012","article-title":"Biological markets and the effects of partner choice on cooperation and friendship","volume":"7","author":"Barclay","year":"2016","journal-title":"Current Opinion in Psychology"},{"key":"ref_4","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"59","DOI":"10.1017\/S0140525X11002202","article-title":"A mutualistic approach to morality: The evolution of fairness by partner choice","volume":"36","author":"Baumard","year":"2013","journal-title":"Behavioral and Brain Sciences"},{"key":"ref_5","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Bentham, J. 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