New Insights into the Moral-Purity Metaphor
Monday, October 18th, 2010
One of the more recent findings in cognitive science is that metaphors run deep. We use metaphors to make sense of the world, come up with new ideas, decide, learn and perform any number of mental activities. Metaphors sit at the center of art, science, religion and culture. Invoking a metaphor can trigger a cascade of automatic associations and thoughts and even influence behavior. Metaphors are powerful primes. From a cognitive design standpoint, we work hard to understand the controlling metaphors operating “between the ears” or our clients.
I am always on the look out for new scientific studies that provide designable insights into the nature of metaphors. Take for example, the recent article in Psychological Science, Dirty Hands and Dirty Mouths, that studied the moral-purity metaphor. In this metaphor, as in all others, we seek to understand an abstract concept in terms of something more sensory or concrete. In the case of the moral-purity metaphor we try and make sense of mortality (the abstraction) by linking it to concrete behaviors involving physical cleanliness. We “wash away our sins” or we threaten to “wash out your mouth” when you use profanity. To quote:
“These findings indicate that the embodiment of moral purity is specific to the motor modality involved in a moral transgression, making purification of the “dirty” body part more desirable than purification of other body parts.”
For example, verbally lying would make the use of mouthwash more desirable. The flip side also appears to be true:
“Note, however, that people not only avoid physical contact with morally tainted people and objects, but also seek physical contact with virtuous ones (Rozin & Nemeroff, 1990). Hence, they may not only attempt to remove the metaphorical residue of immoral acts, but also avoid removing the residue of virtuous acts. In this case, people would find mouthwash particularly unappealing after conveying a virtuous message in a voice mail and hand sanitizer particularly unappealing after conveying a virtuous message in an e-mail.”
The moral-purity metaphor has clear implications for designers working on ethics issues and programs. Very interested to hear from readers working in ethics that are using this or other metaphors.
