Do Chinese Distinguish Between Ethics Of Community, Autonomy And Divinity?

The CAD model has identified three major domains of ethics: the ethics of autonomy, the ethics of community and the ethics of divinity. Moral foundation theory (MFT) further postulates that justice- and harm-related morality are moral foundations of autonomous ethics, and violations of these foundations would elicit anger. Ingroup loyalty and authority are the moral foundations of the ethics of community, and violations of these foundations would evoke contempt. Finally, purity is the moral foundation of the ethics of divinity, and violations of this foundation would elicit disgust. The present study was carried out to evaluate the applicability of the CAD model and MFT in China. We measured Chinese participants' moral concerns in and emotional reactions to a representative sample of 156 culturally relevant immoral events. Based on pretest results, each event was categorized into events that are relevant to one of five moral foundations. The participants were presented with descriptions of the events sequentially and reported their emotions to each event using one of the three response formats (Western emotional faces, emotional words, Asian emotional faces). The results provide consistent support for the applicability of the CAD model and MFT in China.