Ethics Lesson-7

FEELINGS AND MORAL
DECISION-MAKING
SHERWIN S. ALAR, PhD

Professor
FEELINGS AND MORAL
Lesson
7 DECISION-MAKING
When you’re faced with a big decision, do you go with your gut feeling, or do you
make a careful list of pros and cons? Following your intuition can be a great way to tune in
to your true desires. But even when you think your decisions are based on logic, and
common sense, they are often steered by emotion.
HOW ARE DECISIONS EFFECTED BY EMOTION?

Emotions are created when the brain interprets what’s going on around us through our
memories, thoughts, and beliefs. This triggers how we feel, and behave. All our decisions
are influenced by this process in some way.
For example, if you’re feeling happy, you might decide to walk home via a sunny park.
But if you’d been chased by a dog as a child, that same sunny park might trigger feelings of
fear, and you’d take the bus instead. There may be logical arguments to be made either way,
but in the moment, the decision is driven by your emotional state.
Different emotions effect decisions in different ways. If you’re feeling sad, you might be
more willing to settle for things that aren’t in your favor, such as not putting yourself
forward for promotion, or remaining in an unhealthy relationship. But sadness can also
make you more generous — research shows that unhappy people are more likely to be in
favor of increasing benefits to welfare recipients than angry people, who are lacking in
empathy.
Emotions can effect not just the nature of the decision, but the speed at which you make it.
Anger can lead to impatience, and rash decision-making. If you’re excited, you might
make quick decisions without considering the implications, as you surf the wave of
confidence, and optimism about the future. While if you feel afraid, your decisions may be
clouded by uncertainty, and caution, and it might take you longer to choose.
What this means is that your gut feeling plays a huge part in our decision making process,
but at times may be steering you wrong — it might lead to poor judgment, unconscious
bias and recklessness, or risk-aversion. But are there ever occasions when we should pay
attention to our gut instinct?
SHOULD WE ALWAYS IGNORE OUR INTUITION?
A visceral response to a situation could actually be a survival mechanism – the flash of fear
felt by early humans who came face to face with a dangerous animal motivated them to
RUN NOW! They wouldn’t have survived if they stopped to think.
Similarly, if you get a ‘bad feeling’ in the pit of your stomach because of a particular
situation or person, it could be your body’s way of telling you it senses danger, based on
your past experiences, and beliefs.
Of course, this reaction might be completely unfounded, but it might also serve to protect
you from danger, or prevent you repeating past mistakes.
This points to one of the big advantages of instinctive decision-making – it’s quick. If
you’re in a life, or death situation, you don’t want to waste time working through the pros
and cons.
This is true at the other end of the spectrum too, when faced with a choice about something
completely insignificant. No one should spend hours considering the relative advantages of
tea over coffee!
Decisions led by emotion can also be more compassionate, particularly if they effect other
people. We see this at play in stories of people putting their own lives at risk to save
someone else, or when we choose how to break difficult news to a friend.
So sometimes paying attention to our emotions can be a good thing. If you have a regular
mindfulness, or journaling practice, you probably know yourself well, and enjoy a high
level of self-awareness. You might be better off listening to your intuition when it comes to
considering whether a romantic partner is right for you, or whether you should change
careers. Being in emotional balance, and knowing yourself at this deeper level means
you can trust your instincts.
MORAL EMOTIONS
Emotions – that is to say feelings and intuitions – play a major role in most of the ethical
decisions people make. Most people do not realize how much their emotions direct their
moral choices. But experts think it is impossible to make any important moral judgments
without emotions.
Inner-directed negative emotions like guilt, embarrassment, and shame often motivate
people to act ethically.
Outer-directed negative emotions, on the other hand, aim to discipline or punish. For
example, people often direct anger, disgust, or contempt at those who have acted
unethically. This discourages others from behaving the same way.
Positive emotions like gratitude and admiration, which people may feel when they see
another acting with compassion or kindness, can prompt people to help others.
Emotions evoked by suffering, such as sympathy and empathy, often lead people to act
ethically toward others. Indeed, empathy is the central moral emotion that most commonly
motivates prosocial activity such as altruism, cooperation, and generosity.
So, while we may believe that our moral decisions are influenced most by our philosophy
or religious values, in truth our emotions play a significant role in our ethical
decision-making.
ARRIVING AT A MORAL JUDGEMENT
As presented in Chapter 1: Minimum Requirement for Morality, moral judgments or

decisions must be backed by good reasons and requires the impartial consideration of each
individual’s interests.
Now, even though emotions can lead us to make some worthwhile ethical decisions, that is
not always the case as presented in our discussion on Dilemmas, in which you have to
choose between two or more options, all of which would end up badly. In this case, we
cannot just rely on our feelings, no matter how powerful they might be.
Our decisions must be guided as much as possible by reason.The morally right thing to do
is always the thing best supported by the arguments, the facts that surround the problem.
How can we tell if an argument is really good? Get the facts straight. Bring moral
principles into play, and double check if they are justified, and are they being correctly
applied.
The Requirement of Impartiality

Each individual’s interests are equally important, and no one should get special treatment.
If there is no good reason for treating people differently, then discrimination is
unacceptably arbitrary.
The Minimum Conception of Morality

Morality is, at the very least, the effort to guide one’s conduct by reason—that is, to do
what there are the best reasons for doing—while giving equal weight to the interests of
each individual affected by one’s decision.
Remember, the conscientious Moral Agent. . .
✓ Is concerned impartially with the interests of everyone affected by what he or she
does.
✓ Carefully sifts facts and examines their implications.
✓ Accepts principles of conduct only after scrutinizing them to make sure they are
justified.
✓ Is willing to “listen to reason” even when it means revising prior convictions.
✓ Is willing to act on the results of this deliberation.
ACTIVITY NO. 3.1: REAL LIFE DILEMMAS

The following presents real-life dilemmas which you may have encountered one way of the
other. Choose one question and provide a 100-word argument supporting your answer,
using atleast the minimum requirements of Moral Judgement.
1. Should parents monitor teens’ social media activities? - Parents are protective
of their children and seeks to prevent them from becoming the target of malice
online. But teens have a right to privacy and may not want their parents to see
everything they do on social networking sites.
2. Would you report an accident you are responsible for? - Some of us have been
involved in situations where we (accidentally) scratch another car on the way out of
a tight spot in a parking area, or accidentally dropped somebody else’s phone and
cracked the screen. The ethical question is whether to inform the owner of the car
and, if so, how to do it?
3. To cheat or not to cheat - That is the question. No, this is not about what you do
during exams (wink*) but about personal relationships. Would you cheat on your
boyfriend/girlfriend if you can get away with it?
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SOURCES
McCombs School of Business. (2021, January 25). Moral emotions. Ethics

Unwrapped. https://ethicsunwrapped.utexas.edu/glossary/moral-emotions
Rachels, J. 1993. The elements of moral philosophy. Edited by Regan. T. second eded, The
Heritage Series in Philosophy. North Carolina.

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FEELINGS AND MORAL

SHERWIN S. ALAR, PhD

HOW ARE DECISIONS EFFECTED BY EMOTION?

ARRIVING AT A MORAL JUDGEMENT

As presented in Chapter 1: Minimum Requirement for Morality, moral judgments or

The Requirement of Impartiality

The Minimum Conception of Morality

ACTIVITY NO. 3.1: REAL LIFE DILEMMAS

McCombs School of Business. (2021, January 25). Moral emotions. Ethics

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