Heymans Colloquium: B.T. (Bastiaan) Rutjens, Intuitive morality judgments and moral stereotypes of scientists

Dr. B.T. (Bastiaan) Rutjens

(Assistant professor, Department of Psychology, University of Amsterdam)

TITLE

Intuitive morality judgments and moral stereotypes of scientists

DATE & TIME

Thursday, 26 March 2015, 16.00-17.00 hrs

LOCATION

Room M.0061, Munting Building, Grote Kruisstraat 2/1, Groningen

ABSTRACT

Do people think that scientists are bad people? I will describe an ongoing research project in which we investigate morality judgments and stereotypes of scientists. This project is inspired by recent work that showed that atheists were – compared to a wide range of control groups – associated with various morality violations. Our studies reveal that atheists are not alone in ‘the immoral landscape’. First, an intuitive association between scientists and various morality violations was observed. Second, explicit evaluations and stereotypes provide deeper and more nuanced insight into people’s beliefs about scientists’ values, preferences, and motivations. However, there are important differences between perceptions of scientists and atheists and the question “Do people think that scientists are bad people?” does not have a straightforward answer.

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For more information you may contact

dr. T. (Toon) Kuppens,

email  address: t.kuppens rug.nl