What do we do?

Our view is that the best moral philosophy and ethics must be consistent with a psychologically realistic picture of human judgment and decision-making. On the other hand, for scientific work to have real ethical relevance, it has to be informed by in-depth philosophical understanding of the problems we are trying to solve.

We therefore aim to advance studies in philosophical moral psychology through combining rigorous scientific research practices with high-quality philosophical ethics. 

Specifically, we use interdisciplinary methods from experimental philosophy (especially subfields like bioXphi) and moral psychology (the scientific study of the processes that underlie and explain moral judgment, reasoning, agency and behaviour) to advance our understanding of morality.

Principles of beneficence and respect for autonomy are pillars of contemporary medical ethics. But do these explicit principles cohere with the moral reasoning of ordinary patients? And are they extended to all patients equitably? Patients sometimes feel that their decisions are disrespected, or their wellbeing isn't cared for. Certain social groups - such as women, ethnic minorities, or immigrants - are especially likely to feel that they aren't "listened to", that their pain is dismissed, that they aren't believed, or that their rights to make their own medical decisions have been violated - despite being legally competent to make decisions and give consent. We're interested in the experience of harm and injustice in medicine, and in investigating how moral reasoning, and psychological processes such as stereotyping, may contribute to violations of medical ethics. 

We are currently funded by a British Academy Knowledge Frontiers grant to specifically investigate how conceptions of autonomy can be gendered or subject to stereotypes and how this impacts respect for women's autonomous decision-making in different cultural and linguistic settings.

Consent is morally transformative and suffuses our everyday moral and social lives. Valid consent makes the difference between permissible sex and rape; between a medical exam and assault; between entering a person’s home and trespass; between an economic transaction and theft. We need consent to include participants in research, to collect private information, to borrow things, to exchange money, to perform medical procedures, to cut someone’s hair, and to enter into legally binding contracts. Despite the centrality of consent to everyday moral and social life, however, little psychological research has investigated how people determine whether someone else has given valid consent, nor how attributions of consent figure in moral reasoning–how attributing the presence (or lack) of valid consent affects attributions of responsibility, obligations, and permissions to different parties. This line of research aims to understand how people reason about, and navigate, consent-based moral interactions. 

Advances in preimplantation genetic testing (PGT) now allow parents undergoing in vitro fertilization (IVF) to receive probabilistic information about an embryo’s likelihood of developing certain traits and medical conditions. This technology raises important questions: How do people interpret and use this information? What traits or risks do they prioritise? How do ethical, social, and personal factors shape these choices?

To answer these questions, we have collaborated with researchers at the University of Oxford, the University of Exeter, and the National University of Singapore Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine to develop Tinker Tots, an interactive research project designed to explore how people make these difficult choices. We aim to understand the various considerations that entail choosing an embryo for implantation during in vitro fertilization (IVF). This includes various genetic factors such as health conditions (e.g., heart disease, schizophrenia) or traits (e.g., high IQ, musical talent), helping researchers uncover underlying patterns in human values and decision-making. Tinker Tots is part of the ANTITHESES Discovery Research Platform for Transformative Inclusivity in Ethics and Humanities Research funded by the Wellcome Trust. You can explore the project's website here.

Most people believe that it is permissible to give special priority to close friends and family--those who are “near and dear” to us--when deciding how to allocate our time, attention, resources, and acts of care. However, according to the philosophical theory of utilitarianism, the morally correct thing to do is whatever will maximize overall well-being of human beings in general (or even all sentient creatures), impartially or “from the point of view of the universe” -- where no individual person or relationship should count for more than any other. This is a highly counterintuitive moral conclusion from the standpoint of commonsense moral psychology; however, there are some people who explicitly endorse this view, who may or may not self-identify as utilitarians. These people are highly “impartially beneficent”. Why do some people weight the well-being of strangers -- or even people in future generations -- much more highly, compared to close friends and family in the here-and-now, than the average person? And how do these beliefs and commitments actually affect their relationships and behavior?