Public Attitudes Towards Moral Enhancement. Evidence that Means Matter Morally

To gain insight into the reasons that the public may have for endorsing or eschewing pharmacological moral enhancement for themselves or for others, we used empirical tools to explore public attitudes towards these issues. Participants (N = 293) from the United States were recruited via Amazon’s Mechanical Turk and were randomly assigned to read one of several contrastive vignettes in which a 13-year-old child is described as bullying another student in school and then is offered an empathy-enhancing program. The empathy-enhancing program is described as either involving taking a pill or playing a video game on a daily basis for four weeks. In addition, participants were asked to imagine either their own child bullying another student at school, or their own child being bullied by another student. This resulted in a 2 × 2 between-subjects design. In an escalating series of morally challenging questions, we asked participants to rate their overall support for the program; whether they would support requiring participation; whether they would support requiring participation of children who are at higher risk to become bullies in the future; whether they would support requiring participation of all children or even the entire population; and whether they would be willing to participate in the program themselves. We found that people were significantly more troubled by pharmacological as opposed to non-pharmacological moral enhancement interventions. The results indicate that members of the public for the greater part oppose pharmacological moral bioenhancement, yet are open to non-biomedical means to attain moral enhancement. [248 words]. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s12152-017-9340-9) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Imagine that your 13-year-old child was being bullied by another student at school. The school has a program that has been shown to be effective in reducing bullying in carefully carried out studies. The program involves the following: over the course of 4 weeks, each day the bully takes a pill that increases empathy for others. The pill is based on the natural hormone oxytocin, and improves the bully's ability to understand what other people are feeling. Studies have shown that the program reduces bullying by 40%, with no side effects. The reduction in bullying persists for 6 months after the program is complete. [104 words] Imagine that your 13-year-old child was bullying another student at school. The school has a program that has been shown to be effective in reducing bullying in carefully carried out studies. The program involves the following: over the course of 4 weeks, each day the bully takes a pill that increases empathy for others. The pill is based on the natural hormone oxytocin, and improves the bully's ability to understand what other people are feeling. Studies have shown that the program reduces bullying by 40%, with no side effects. The reduction in bullying persists for 6 months after the program is complete. [102 words]

NON-PHARMACOLOGICAL/ OWN CHILD BULLIES
Imagine that your 13-year-old child was being bullied by another student at school. The school has a program that has been shown to be effective in reducing bullying in carefully carried out studies. The program involves the following: over the course of 4 weeks, each day the bully plays a video game that increases empathy for others. The video game is based on best educational practices, and improves the bully's ability to understand what other people are feeling. Studies have shown that the program reduces bullying by 40%, with no side effects. The reduction in bullying persists for 6 months after the program is complete. [105 words] Imagine that your 13-year-old child was bullying another student at school. The school has a program that has been shown to be effective in reducing bullying in carefully carried out studies. The program involves the following: over the course of 4 weeks, each day the bully plays a video game that increases empathy for others. The video game is based on best educational practices, and improves the bully's ability to understand what other people are feeling. Studies have shown that the program reduces bullying by 40%, with no side effects. The reduction in bullying persists for 6 months after the program is complete. [103 words] Q1. To what degree do you think that it would be a good idea for the bully to participate in a program like the one described above? There is an alternative program that is equally effective in increasing empathy for others, but involves the following: over the course of 4 weeks, each day the bully takes a pill that increases empathy for others. The pill is based on the natural hormone oxytocin, and improves the bully's ability to understand what other people are feeling. Once again, studies have shown that the program reduces bullying by 40%, with no side effects. The reduction in bullying persists for 6 months after the program is complete.
There is an alternative program that is equally effective in increasing empathy for others, but involves the following: over the course of 4 weeks, each day the bully plays a video game that increases empathy for others. The video game is based on best educational practices, and improves the bully's ability to understand what other people are feeling. Once again, studies have shown that the program reduces bullying by 40%, with no side effects. The reduction in bullying persists for 6 months after the program is complete.
Given that this alternative program exists, to what degree do you think that it would be a good idea for the bully described above to be required to participate in this alternative program?  (29) problems should not be remedied by taking drugs, comments that there is nothing medically wrong with the child/ no medical condition/ no acute medical condition, general comments that drugs are bad, wrong, or should not be used, as well as concerns that the program is artificial or not natural (e.g. chemical feelings, hormones) Need for (more) permanent and less superficial solution: this code captures concerns that the program offers no permanent or durable solution to the bullying, and/ or that the program should not sidestep the real issues, that it should address underlying causes, not symptoms, as well as comments that express disbelief that the program will be effective after six months, after the program stops, in the long term, etc.
Alternatives First/ last resort: this code captures comments that other ways of dealing with the bullying child need to be tried first, as well as comments that the program should be a last resort, or only be used for the most grave instances.
Autonomy: this code captures comments that the bully should have the right to consent to the program, or that the program infringes on his autonomy Identity, personality, fundamental changes to the self, diversity: this code captures comments that a person should not be asked, or forced to change his personality, as well as comments that ask who should decide what kind of changes in personality would in fact be desirable, and comments that people differ and that diversity in personality traits should be embraced instead of eliminated.
Parents should decide: this code captures comments that parents should be consulted, and consent to the program Doctor should be consulted: this code captures comments that a doctor needs to be consulted Ambivalent Ambivalent: When it was overtly stated one or more reasons for and against the program, or that the commenter was unsure.
Appropriate reaction to bullying/ The problem underlying bullying that needs to be addressed is: