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Introduction
According to Lagos-Vargas & Keupuchur-Natalini (2019), inquiring and intervening in moral reasoning is imperative due to violence and immoralities in today’s society. In this way, low moral competence in students is associated with high levels of incorrect and immoral actions, such as intimidation in the school environment (Von Grundherr et al., 2017). Furthermore, according to Faiciuc (2020), if moral competence is not developed in university students, they act dishonestly and use deception (Faiciuc, 2020).
Various authors, such as Etxeberria et al. (2018) and Faiciuc (2020), recognize that people’s emotional impulses are those that determine moral competence and tend to conflict with duty. In this way, this competence depends on the cognitive structure, but, above all, it depends on the emotional structure (Amorim & Sastre, 2003; Lindauer et al., 2020; Osorio, 2018; Vélez & Ostrosky-Solís, 2006).
Moral competence is firstly constituted by an emotional reaction, loaded with energy that impulses the action, which is right away cognitively evaluated based on whether that impulse was correct or incorrect (Etxeberria et al., 2018; Illouz, 2009), where both emotional and cognitive structures operate coherently in moral competence (Bericat, 2018; Caro et al., 2018; Pinedo et al., 2017).
Several studies carried out by Cameille (2013), Lagos-Vargas & Keupuchur-Natalini (2019), Meza & Guerrero (2016), and Osorio (2018) have shown low levels of moral competence in university students, which indicates the importance of ethical-educational interventions (Cameille, 2013; Ramírez, 2019).
In this regard, there are not many studies on the correction of moral behavior in university students (Lagos-Vargas & Keupuchur-Natalini, 2019; Meza & Guerrero, 2016; Osorio, 2018), and there are even fewer interventions to improve moral competence from the emotional structure that include the moral emotions (Cameille, 2013; Iriarte et al., 2006).
Contrarily, some interventions from the cognitivist perspective persist, such as those proposed by Gutiérrez & Vivó (2005), Hernández & Planchuelo (2014), and Lind (2005), which have not provided effective results in the improvement of moral competence in student populations, workers, or teachers (Robles, 2011). This shows that cognitive theory, as Kohlberg & Hersh (2009) had already mentioned, is insufficient to increase moral competence.
Thus, the purpose of the present study is to show the improvement of moral competence from an intervention, in which it is deliberated on emotional moral dilemmas, where the participants share related sensations and emotions. This improvement, it is presumed, is reflected in an increase in the index of moral competence.
Theoretical Framework
In the 20th century, according to Mandler (1990) and Ruiz & Navarro (2018), there had been a paradigm shift on the part of William James, who founded the theory on emotional experience and specified it as an indirectly excited feeling. The axiom that contradicted what was established by Wundt (1979) mentions that a feeling is not an atomistic process related to an emotion, the affective aspect is not a mere extension of the cognitive aspect (Mandler, 1990; Ruiz & Navarro, 2018).
James (1989) thus introduced the first constructivist psychology of emotion through the study of behavior generating processes and conscious experiences (Mandler, 1990; Ruiz & Navarro, 2018). James (1989) established instinctual automaticity, in which moral judgment was similar to the aesthetic one in its emotional framework and the sudden emotional appraisal. According to Mandler (1990) and Ruiz & Navarro (2018), James’ theoretical explanations, the persistent research on the emotional pattern, and the cognitive discovery of visceral theoretical explanations about emotion are still valid.
In such a way, the moral, pleasant, or painful evaluation is originated by primary sensory responses, which characterize a pure sensation (James, 1989). Thus, it is recognized that emotions in moral competence are more effective than pure cognitive structure, since some more contemporary authors, such as Lindauer et al. (2020), Huhtala & Holma (2019), and Conejero et al. (2019), have shown that emotions are more important than the rational process in moral judgment, with a high predominance of the affective structure.
In this regard, Kohlberg (2009) (cited by Caro et al., 2018) already assumed that the cognitive theory of moral judgment was not sufficient for moral action, that other factors had to be considered, and that is why Amorim & Sastre (2003) suggest that the emotional needs of human beings must be considered since moral action is motivated more by the emotional reflection than by the cognitive process (Haidt & Lukianoff, 2018; Waytz et al., 2019).
Likewise, other authors such as Lindauer et al. (2020) are skeptical about the cognitive predominance of moral reasoning, since Piaget (1984) recognized the affective preexistence that directs moral rules, and that the emotional control of the person is regulated and restricted by external individuals. Lindauer et al. (2020), Demos (2019), and Mercadante et al. (2021) have supported the emotional importance in moral competence, in that the emotions linked to this competence are recognized as moral emotions, which are instantaneous reactions where the individual responds suddenly from his/her affective system to balance a fair relationship (Bericat, 2018; Cresswell et al., 2017), thus, forming the basis of moral competence from moral emotions (Englander et al., 2012; Greene et al., 2004; Prinz, 2018).
Therefore, moral competence integrates cognitive organization (Caro et al., 2018; Kohlberg & Hersh, 2009); the affective system (Demos, 2019; Keltner & Haidt, 1999; Waytz et al., 2019); and the id, the ego, and the superego (Freud, 2019; Stoltz, 2018), where the ego is the mediating part between the id and the superego of the person, apart from being a moderator with the egos of the other individuals that surround him/her (Caro et al., 2018; Freud, 2019).
In addition, the way in which the ego wield justice affects the moral emotions of the human being (Demos, 2019; Freud, 2019; Waytz et al., 2019). Jointly, the egos of other people have the role of moral judge, they carry the emotional relationship between the moral authority and the actions of the person, which founded the moral interaction in the life of the individual (Conejero et al., 2019; Demos, 2019).
In the interaction, a reciprocal morality is predominantly assumed, because it fosters the acquisition of an autonomous moral conscience and the environment as the cause on the precepts of moral development (Babakr et al., 2019; Demos, 2019). This forces individuals to take a relative position with respect to others without eliminating their own perspectives (Babakr et al., 2019; Caro et al., 2018).
Thus, the moral development of the person implies an evolution of basic moral emotions such as guilt (Demos, 2019; Freud, 2019) and pride (Kaufman, 1996; Tracy et al., 2020). Guilt results from the effect of the anguish of punishment on the id carried out by the superego (as a moral conscience) and the tensions between the anguish with the ego, acting as a painful emotion (Freud, 2019; Mejía, 2002). Conversely, the emotion of pride is a pleasant sensation which consciously recognizes the success achieved, something that exalts dignity (Árdal, 1989; Kaufman, 1996; Tracy et al., 2020). So, pride is an emotion contrary to guilt, a pleasant self-evaluation (Árdal, 1989; Tracy et al., 2020), causing in this way that self-conscious emotions incite a positive or negative self-assessment of the individual’s ego, motivating a positive or negative reinforcement of his/her behavior (Árdal, 1989; Szncer, 2019; Tracy et al., 2020).
Likewise, the maturity of the individual implies less enjoyment and greater self-awareness of guilt (Mejía, 2002), where the habituation of painful emotion can make that any pleasant experience means an immense enjoyment, greater than in another person who is not accustomed to it (Etxeberria et al., 2018). Contrarily, the individual will suffer an immense pain if this individual is not used to suffering, confirming that guilt and pride are primary motivators of moral competence (Demos, 2019; Illouz, 2009; Tracy et al., 2020).
Considering the moral emotional evolution, together with the cognitive development, three pertinent emotional moral levels are established (Caro et al., 2018). At the first level, the emotional preconventional, there is a first phase, where the person feels guilty or proud, seeking selfishly and exclusively the pleasant sensation of pride over guilt (Demos, 2019; Freud, 2019). A second emotional moral phase of this level is recognized, because only one authority is identified to whom the highest moral authority is attributed (Faigenbaum et al., 2014).
The second conventional emotional level is made up of a third phase, where the subject feels pleasure in complying with the group rules and proud of belonging to the group (Caro et al., 2018; Etxeberria et al., 2018), or they may feel guilty for breaching them and being expelled (Gray, 2008). In the phase four of this level, the social aspect sets the guideline of the control, pointing out to the people guilty of not complying them, adapting them to pain and reducing the enjoyable thing (Caro et al., 2018; Gray, 2008; Jaramillo, 1992).
The last level, the post-conventional emotional level, is made up of phase five, in which it implies an emotional breakdown of the individual, caused by stigmatization or guiltiness, pointed out by a minority (Etxeberria et al., 2018; Shi, 2009). In the sixth phase, the person corrects the moral imperatives and will seek a higher emotional self-perception, feeling proud of himself/herself (Shi, 2009). Thus, moral competence transcends from the emotional impulse (Etxeberria et al., 2018; Illouz, 2009), following six emotional stages operating coherently with the cognitive structure (Bericat, 2018; Pinedo et al., 2017).
In such way, six emotional levels of the moral competence are shown, establishing an intervention framework for their development from moral emotions (Iriarte et al., 2006; Cameille, 2013), particularly guilt (Etxeberria et al., 2018) and pride (Shi, 2009). Thus, these emotions form the main support of its improvement, which are culturally differentiated and become the object of social norms (Camio, 2012).
With this, according to García (2012), the increase in moral competence depends on the emotional stage and the emotional experiences of individuals. Thus, personal interactions are framed in a particular moral environment, the socio-emotional structure of justice, which determines their level of moral competence (Barreiro, 2012). Likewise, interactions are established in the perception of the individual as dilemmas between two scenarios, one interior referred to emotions, fantasies, and representations of the subject, and one exterior related to social and cultural relationships (Grasseli & Salomone, 2012).
On the other hand, according to the suggestion of Grasseli & Salomone (2012), the moral development of the individual is gestated in his/her social dynamics, through work on him/herself, recognizing the dialectical unity between subject and history, where the life story makes it possible to give an objective treatment of the subject’s past and reconstruct the outline of his/her life by stages.
In this way, a moral competence intervention procedure must consider the person’s trajectory, which, according to Elder (1991), refers to a period of life that changes direction. In other words, a turning point is formed by particular events, which cause strong emotional changes, translated into an important shift in the course of moral life. This change arises from identifiable events or emotionally relevant subjective situations. In any case, there is a change that implies the deviation in one or more points of the vital trajectory (Blanco, 2011).
As can be seen, the human being is immersed in social relationships, forming emotional dilemmas in internal and external scenarios, having trajectories with own inflections and intersubjective interpretations of both suffering and pleasure (Bermúdez, 2013), guilt (Freud, 2019), and pride (Tracy et al., 2020).
In this way, an intervention was designed by posing emotional moral dilemmas, where the participant reflects and deliberates in small groups. In the deliberation, according to Panea (2018), metaphors, images, and emotions are used, among other resources, sparking a concatenation of psychological processes to dictate a moral sentence. This intervention procedure implies, in addition to group deliberation, the moral emotional inflection of a personal trajectory and emotional, pleasant, and unpleasant interaction.
Based on the aforementioned, the hypothesis of the present study was established as follows:
H: An intervention, through the deliberation of emotional moral dilemmas and through life trajectory, increases the moral competence of the participants, particularly across individual interactions about moral emotions and feelings about guilt and pride.
Materials and methods
In this research, the quasi-experimental method was employed, using a pretest-posttest design with a control group. The experimental group for the intervention and a control group were considered to have a reference for comparison. The two groups presented low indices of moral competence.
The changes in moral competence was determined as the dependent variable, and the intervention procedure as the independent variable (Hernández et al., 2014), where the general stages of the intervention are: the exposure of the emotional moral dilemmas, the deliberation, the manifestation of an emotional moral trajectory, the interaction, the communication of the sensations and the emotions of the participants.
Participants
Young student volunteers were summoned in April 2021 from a public university in the Bajio area of Mexico for a prior evaluation. From an undergraduate university population of more than twenty thousand students (20 214), a sample of 264 participants was obtained, with a confidence level of 95% and a margin of error of 6%, with an average age of 21.21 years (standard deviation = 2.1), 163 males and 101 females. The members of the sample answered the emotional moral test (EMT) (Robles, 2019), evaluating their moral competence from the emotional moral competence index (EMCI) and registering their emotional moral balance (EMB) (Robles, 2021).
The control and experimental groups were randomly selected from those who obtained low levels of moral competence and low or negative values of emotional moral balance in the previous assessment.
The selection criteria of the participants were: (1) a level of negative emotional moral balance (EMB ≤ -13), calculated by subtraction of the population mean minus one standard deviation (EMB Mean = 7.6; EMB SD = 5.4) and (2) a very low level of moral competence (EMCI Mean = 20), quantified by subtracting the population mean minus one standard deviation (EMCI Mean = 31.8; EMCI SD = 11.8). Thus, an experimental group made up of 26 participants (14 females and 12 males), with an average age of 21 and one standard deviation of 2.24 was proposed. In addition, the control group had a total of 26 participants (13 females and 13 males), with an average age of 21 and a standard deviation of 1.7. The two groups answered the EMT before and after the intervention.
Intervention
Duration
The intervention consisted of six sessions, at the rate of one per week, lasting an average of 90 minutes each, on Wednesdays at 7:00 p.m., in a virtual environment, using the Zoom platform. The material and the monitoring of each session were carried out through the drive of a class in the classroom platform.
Session structure
Each session integrated a deliberation (Panea, 2018) on an emotional scenario or dilemma (Grasseli & Salomone, 2012). The participants individually reflected and discussed (in small groups) about pleasant and painful sensations (Bermúdez, 2013). The session procedure presented in Table 1 was carried out in seven phases. The first phase of each session consisted of instructions and an informed consent letter. The second consisted of the reading of the emotional dilemma by the facilitator, the reflection on the story, and individual responses of each participant, on what the protagonist of the story felt. The third phase contemplated the discussion in small groups of three to five members each. The fourth involved the plenary discussion between all the teams and participants. The fifth included the discussion in small groups of opinions and feelings different from those of the team. The sixth was a plenary conversation between all the participants, and the seventh involved the expression of the feelings of the participants throughout the session and closing of the session. In each phase, the time of duration was recorded, supervised by the facilitator, and it was followed up by a button on the form on the drive for the registration and continuation of each of the phases; otherwise, the participant could not continue.
Table 1 Session process (English version).
| Phase | Process |
| 1. | Instructions and informed consent. |
| 2 | The second, in the reading of the emotional dilemma by the facilitator, the reflection on the story and individual responses of each participant on what the protagonist of the story felt. The participants answered: how painful do you think it was for Pérez manager? how much guilt did Pérez manager feel? |
| 3. | The third phase contemplated the discussion in groups of three to five members, ranking their opinions about the protagonist’s emotions. |
| 4. | Plenary discussion between all the teams and participants. Participants listen and put attention to what each one explains in the debate on "Nothing or a little painful" and on "Much guilt and pain". |
| 5. | Discussion in the same small groups, ranking different opinions about the protagonist’s emotions. |
| 6. | Plenary conversation between teams and all participants. Similar and different feelings, emotions. |
| 7. | Plenary closing. Sensations, emotions throughout the session. |
Source: Author’s own elaboration.
Emotional dilemmas
In Table 2, five emotional moral scenarios and an autobiographical request for an emotional moral trajectory were selected, pretending that these act as stimuli and, above all, as incremental factors of the moral competence of the participants. The first dilemma dealt with emotional conflict and guilt over the firing of a manager. The second scenario, presented in Appendix 1, was about the shame of parental incest and the emotional moral conflict resolved with the suicide of the protagonist. The third refers to the autobiographical trajectory with an emotional moral inflection, where each participant shared his/her own experience, identifying a moral and emotionally relevant change. The fourth had to do with the salvation of a life that caused a gratifying emotion, it was about the pride and happiness of the protagonist hero. The fifth raised shared innovation, which motivated the emotional satisfaction and pride of an engineer. The sixth showed a situation where two students were expelled from school, this circumstance caused an emotional conflict for the director, because he was excessively involved with affected pupils. It should be noted that the central questions that triggered the deliberation dealt with the sensations (painful or pleasant) and the moral emotions (guilt and pride) of the protagonist of the story.
Table 2 Sessions and dilemmas.
| Session | Dilemma |
| 1 | Pérez manager |
| 2 | Fredy in the Oasis |
| 3 | Participant’s trajectory |
| 4 | Mary nurse |
| 5 | Hernández engineer |
| 6 | José’s Director |
Source: Author’s own elaboration.
The dilemmas were previously written by the main author of this article. This author has written and tested more than 10 dilemmas in various population contexts. The dilemmas were previously tested with a pilot group from the same population. From a bank of dilemmas, there were chosen those that reflected a medium and high emotional impact on the population and that were linked to the environment of the participating population. It was intended that the five dilemmas stimulate sensations and, above all, exalt moral emotions, shame, moral horror, guilt and pride.
Emotional moral test (EMT)
The participants, from the sample and from the groups, answered the emotional moral test (EMT) (Robles, 2019). The EMT narrates the story of an involuntary parricide by a young man, an act committed in defense of his own life and belongings to the attempted assault of a mature-aged criminal who turned out to be his father. The EMT inquires about the emotion of the protagonist of the story through 12 items, six of guilt and six of pride, corresponding to the six emotional moral phases. The moral competence is recorded using the emotional moral competence index (EMCI) and emotional moral balance (EMB) through the difference of the emotional moral competence sub-indices (EMCSi), between Guilt-EMCSi and Pride-EMCSi (Robles, 2019).
The EMCI measures the consistency of the emotional moral phases corresponding to the reactive responses of guilt and pride about the outcome of the parricide. The Guilt-EMCSi and the Pride-EMCSi record the total of the six moral phases of guilt and the six of pride, respectively.
Analysis of data
For the descriptive analysis, the continuous variables were characterized with the mean and standard deviation. To analyze the effectiveness of the intervention, the differences between the values of the variables before and after the intervention were analyzed. In addition, the normality condition was analyzed with the Shapiro-Wilk test (Gómez-Gómez et al., 2013).
To determine the variables related to the difference in EMCI and the emotional moral balance resulting from the intervention, univariate linear regression analyzes were performed for each group, and all the statistical analysis was performed with the software SPSS version 23.
Results
The Shapiro-Wilk test presented in Table 3 showed normality in the control and experimental groups, before and after the intervention, with values from 0.052 to 0.879.
Table 3 Normality test for experimental and control Groups.
| Group | Variable | Subgroup | Shapiro-Wilk | ||
| Statistic | Df | Sig. | |||
| Control | EMCI | Pretest- | 0.925 | 26 | 0.059 |
| postest- | 0.890 | 26 | 0.052 | ||
| EME | Pretest- | 0.937 | 26 | 0.113 | |
| postest- | 0.948 | 26 | 0.212 | ||
| Experimental | EMCI | Pretest | 0.906 | 26 | 0.071 |
| Postest | 0.939 | 26 | 0.129 | ||
| EME | Pretest | 0.977 | 26 | 0.806 | |
| Postest | 0.980 | 26 | 0.879 | ||
Source: Author’s own elaboration.
The differences in means between the control and experimental groups are shown in Table 4. The experimental group had an increase of 14 points in moral competence and more than 8 points in emotional balance, while the control had a negative difference of 13 points in moral competence and an increase of 12 points in emotional balance.
Table 4 Mean differences between experimental and control groups.
| Control | Experimental | |||||
| Pre-test | Pos-test | Difference | Pre-test | Pos-test | Difference | |
| EMCI | 22% | 9% | - 13% | 19% | 33% | + 14% |
| EME | 17.1 | 29.1 | + 12 | - 12.6 | - 4.4 | + 8.2 |
Source: Author’s own elaboration.
In Table 5, the results of the univariate analysis of moral competence and emotional balance of the experimental group are expressed. It was observed that significant values and high values of the effect were registered in the partial eta squared and the observed power is high in moral competence (EMCI), while the same statistics (eta = 0.053; observed power = 0.378) showed a medium effect on emotional moral balance (EMB) and a non-significant value (0.099 > 0.05).
Table 5 Test of between subjects’ effects experimental group.
| Independent variable | F | Sig | Partial eta squared | Observed power |
| EMCI | 8.981 | 0.004 | 0.152 | 0.836 |
| EMB | 2.822 | 0.099 | 0.053 | 0.378 |
Source: Author’s own elaboration.
In Table 6, the results of the univariate analysis of moral competence and emotional moral balance of the control group are shown. It was observed that the significance value and the values of the partial square eta and the observed power are high in moral competence (EMCI), while the same statistics show a medium effect on emotional balance.
Discussion
This research provides relevant advances on the application of the theoretical perspectives on moral emotions provided by Lindauer et al. (2020), Demos (2019), Tracy et al. (2020), and Robins (2021), among others. Conjointly, the applied intervention, through the deliberation of emotional moral dilemmas, serves as a tool to develop and raise low levels of moral competence, enabling the prevention of immoral impulses and behaviors, as suggested by Meza & Guerrero (2016).
In such a way, one can be optimistic in that, through interventions of this type, it is possible to improve moral competence and prevent behavioral imbalances and incorrect behaviors (Azimpour et al., 2018; Meza & Guerrero, 2016; Osorio, 2018).
The successful results on the efficacy of this intervention, which uses deliberation on guilt or pride in emotional moral stories, resolve the limitations of the cognitivist interventions carried out by Hernández & Planchuelo (2014), Lind (2005), and Gutiérrez & Vivó (2005).
Conclusions
The intervention through moral emotions resulted efficacious in increasing moral competence, particularly in students with a very low level. This increase is remarkable, even outstanding, since the control group registered a significant decrease in the same competence, nearly equal to the increase in the experimental group. This means that the competence of the experimental group would also have declined if this group had not been intervened. However, with regard to emotional moral balance, although it could be compensated through the intervention, the balance achieved was not significant and it obtained only a medium effect.
Definitively, it is concluded that the intervention through emotional moral dilemmas, also considering the reflection on sensations and emotions, essentially guilt and pride, reliably increases moral competence and moderately corrects the emotional moral imbalance.
Conflict of interest
The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest derived from this research.
