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Utilitarian Traits and the Janus-Headed Model: Origins, Meaning, and Interpretation

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Abstract

Two distinct and perhaps mutually exclusive understandings of utilitarianism have emerged in the ethics literature. Utilitarianism is typically regarded as an approach to determine ethicality by focusing on whether or not actions produce the greater good, but has also been conceptualized as a set of traits to which individuals might be predisposed. This paper is designed to clarify the meaning and implications of such utilitarian traits as “results-oriented,” “innovative,” and “a winner.” Although the Janus-headed model of ethical theory from which these traits emerged had been acknowledged by its developer as possibly misrepresenting typical views of utilitarianism, much research using these traits appears to have been conducted without clear recognition of this. If the conceptual foundation underpinning hypothesis development is disconnected from the measure used to test them, then little support for relevant predictions should emerge. A review of the literature which featured utilitarian traits generally confirmed this. This paper also explored the origins and emergence of these traits and suggested that existing evidence that these measure utilitarian ethical predispositions is not especially persuasive. Understanding what utilitarian traits do not assess is critical in order for knowledge about this potentially useful measure to advance.

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Notes

  1. Brady (1985) did not specify the precise meaning of “classic” or “traditional” views of utilitarianism, and did not identify the proponents of such views. An overview of all possible ethical models generally and all variants in utilitarianism specifically (e.g., “preference”, “ideal”, or “world” utilitarianism; Sinnott-Armstrong 2015), including the extent to which utilitarianism might incorporate self-interest in some interpretations, is beyond the scope of this paper. However, Mill’s ideas on the subject seem adequate for gaining a basic understanding of the conceptual foundation from which utilitarian traits emerged. Utilitarianism, after all, “is primarily based on the writings of Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill” (Schwartz and Carroll 2008, p. 159; see also Carroll and Buchholtz 2015, Chapter 8); that is, the “Classical Utilitarians” (Driver 2014). Many researchers who have used the utilitarian traits measure also referred to Mill by name (discussed later in the paper), and thus appear to have regarded, perhaps implicitly, Mill’s approach as adequate for the purposes of providing background.

  2. Nozick’s reference to “two powerful molds” has seemed important in the context of research into utilitarian traits, and was discussed by Alder et al. (2007, 2008), Schminke (2001), Schminke et al. (2003, 1997), and Wiltermuth et al. (2013).

  3. Schminke and Wells (1999) and Schminke et al. (2002) both considered the impact of leadership on changes in utilitarianism and formalism in student groups over time, and focused on changes in trait scores at the group level. Schminke et al. (2003) asked participants to think about an ethical dilemma that occurred away from work, and to respond to MEV items in that specific context rather than as to how they would normally respond. Cojuharenco et al. (2012) had respondents indicate the importance of traits that describe others rather than themselves. Wiltermuth et al. (2013, p. 289) and Xu and Ma (2016, p. 541) mentioned using the Brady and Wheeler (1996) measure, but did not appear to have discussed any pertinent results. Xu and Ma (2016, Table 2) operationalized “utilitarianism” as a dichotomous variable, with “1” representing “utilitarianism” and “0” suggesting “deontology”.

  4. Two additional measures of ‘utilitarianism’ are the Survey of Ethical Theoretic Aptitudes (Brady 1990) used, for example, by Love et al. (2016), Schminke (1997), and Smith et al. (2009), and the single-item Baugher and Weisbord (2009) measure (“The greatest good for the greatest number is the only proper measure of right and wrong”) used by Wiltermuth et al. (2013). As no evidence appears to have yet been provided about the extent to which MEV utilitarian trait scores correlate with these other measures, these measures are not discussed further.

  5. The construct assessed with utilitarian traits has been referred to as “ethical viewpoints” (Schminke 2001), “moral orientation” (Wiltermuth and Flynn 2013), and variations on the term “consequentialism” (Albert et al. 2015; Reynolds and Ceranic 2007; Reynolds et al. 2014; Ruedy and Schweitzer 2010; Verbos and Miller 2015). Regardless of the nomenclature used, each of these terms referred to the construct assessed with utilitarian traits developed by Brady and Wheeler (1996).

  6. Although Alder et al. (2008) predicted that utilitarian traits would moderate the positive relationships between the perceived usefulness of internet monitoring and four outcome measures, these predicted positive relationships did not actually emerge. The largest of four relevant correlations was .05 (Table 1, p. 491). Moreover, two of the three items in the measure of monitoring usefulness had no relevance to internet monitoring. As results cannot be interpreted unambiguously, the partial hypothesis support reported in this study seems of limited relevance to determining whether or not utilitarian traits assess utilitarian ethical predispositions.

  7. The mean “frequency of cheating” score among college students in Study 1 was 1.42 with a standard deviation of 0.31. A score two standard deviations above the mean equaled 2.04 on a four-point scale (“1” = never, “4” = many times), and thus there was a low frequency of admitted cheating in this sample. The positive relationship between utilitarian trait scores and cheating frequency reported in regression analyses (r = .06, ns) can perhaps be interpreted to suggest that high trait scorers had rarely or sometimes cheated (the precise meaning of a score of “2” was not specified).

  8. Schminke et al. (1997, p. 1203) “speculate[d] about the reasons” for unexpected negative relationships between fairness in respondents’ own organizations and MEV scores, and noted that “further research is needed to address” why “higher ethical scores may result in lower perceptions of procedural and distributive fairness”. However, as low justice scores implied “very” fair procedures and outcomes in one’s own organization (p. 1196), speculation or further research seemed unnecessary. Actual results corresponded with expectations, and high utilitarian trait scorers perceived work outcomes as fair rather than unfair.

  9. The complexity involved in determining an action’s ethicality from a utilitarian perspective implies the ability not only to identify benefits and harms from various courses of action to all relevant stakeholders, but also to weigh these to isolate the action providing the largest benefit-to-harm ratio. Ascertaining utilitarianism as preferable to other options such as the categorical imperative assumes that it is possible to: (1) use multiple approaches at more than a superficial level in real-world decision making; (2) understand the criteria that would make one approach ‘better than’ another; and (3) determine based on objective evidence that utilitarianism was indeed ‘better’. However, if the moral “theories that most people actually use are quite simple and vague” (Curzer 2014, p. 108) and “many people have trouble applying their moral theories correctly” (p. 107), then few people would seem able to conclude with certainty that utilitarianism is ‘best’.

  10. Different ethical approaches would likely tend to produce the same conclusion about an action’s ethicality in many, if not most, cases. Many actions prohibited by ethical norms, after all, tend to create harms, and individuals with different preferences would be in total agreement that such actions would be unethical. When disagreement did exist, an action that appears ethically permissible to one person because it promotes more benefit than harm might seem unethical to another because it violates one or more norms. However, such disagreement would have little real-world import if different preferences led to the same action (or no action). People differ in their “moral motivation” (Rest et al. 1999, p. 101) to translate beliefs about ethicality into behavior, and not everyone would necessarily perform ethically questionable actions even though they seem to produce the greater good.

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Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank Diane Swanson, editor R. Edward Freeman, and four anonymous reviewers for valuable comments on earlier versions of the paper.

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  1. Department of Management, Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS, 66506, USA

    Peter E. Mudrack

  2. Department of Organizational Behaviour, Human Resources, Entrepreneurship and Ethics, Brock University, St. Catharines, ON, L2S 3A1, Canada

    E. Sharon Mason

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Mudrack, P.E., Mason, E.S. Utilitarian Traits and the Janus-Headed Model: Origins, Meaning, and Interpretation. J Bus Ethics 156, 227–240 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-017-3592-5

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