Comparative Analysis of Moral Intuition in Western and Eastern Traditions

Thesis Abstract

This study investigates the comparative structure and content of moral intuition across Western and Eastern philosophical traditions, addressing gaps in cross-cultural moral psychology that have historically underemphasized non-Western evaluative frameworks and the situated nature of intuitive moral judgment. The problem centers on whether cultivated moral intuitions, shaped by distinct normative environments—principally Western deontological, virtue-ethical, and consequentialist streams versus Eastern confucian, daoist, and buddhist orientations—exhibit convergences or systematic divergences in content, underpinned by culturally specific epistemic values and social roles. The aim is to delineate how moral intuitions are shaped by normative commitments, pedagogical practices, and cultural cognition, and to assess the degree to which intuition-guided judgments align with or diverge from explicit ethical theory across traditions. Specific objectives include (1) mapping core moral intuitions endorsed by Western and Eastern respondents in controlled vignettes, (2) identifying the cognitive processes linked to intuitive judgments using dual-process theory, (3) testing the predictive validity of named theories—Kohlberg’s stages of moral development, Haidt’s Moral Foundations Theory on the Western side, and Nakamura and Csikszentmihalyi’s concepts of flourishing and moral cultivation on the Eastern side—(4) evaluating the role of social context and relational norms in shaping intuitive judgments, and (5) proposing an integrated framework for cross-cultural moral intuition. The methodology employs a mixed methods design with a cross-sectional, cross-cultural survey and experimental vignette experiments. The population comprises adults aged 25–60 from three metropolitan centers representing Western (London), East Asian (Singapore), and South Asian diaspora contexts (Mumbai). A stratified random sample of 600 participants (200 per site) ensures balanced representation by gender, education, and urban exposure. Data collection instruments include a standardized moral intuition vignettes battery, the Moral Foundations Questionnaire adapted for cross-cultural relevance, and response-time measures to assess implicit processing, complemented by semi-structured interviews with a subsample of 60 participants (20 per site) to elicit contextual attributions and rationalizations. Validity and reliability are ensured via back-translation procedures, pilot testing (N=60), Cronbach’s alpha checks (? > 0.75 for core scales), and measurement invariance testing across groups. Data analysis proceeds through descriptive statistics, multigroup confirmatory factor analysis to establish cross-cultural measurement invariance, structural equation modeling to test the interaction of cultural orientation with intuitive judgments, and regression analyses (including hierarchical linear modeling) to assess predictors of intuitive judgments while controlling for education and socioeconomic status. Thematic analysis of interview transcripts is employed to extract culturally salient rationales, and regression-based mediation analyses examine whether perceived relational obligations mediate intuitive responses. It is anticipated that results will reveal partial convergence in universal moral intuitions in situations involving harm aversion and fairness, alongside robust divergence in norms governing authority, loyalty, purity, and relational context, with Haidt’s moral foundations showing differential weighting across traditions and Western rational-actor ideals aligning more with universalist intuitions, while Eastern responses emphasize relational and communal considerations. The study is expected to contribute to knowledge by offering an empirically grounded, theoretically informed cross-cultural model of moral intuition that integrates deontological, virtue-ethical, and relational ethics perspectives within a common analytical framework, thereby refining our understanding of moral cognition and its socio-cultural determinants. Findings will inform the development of culturally sensitive ethical pedagogy, comparative ethics curricula, and policy discourse on cross-cultural moral disagreement. The main conclusion posits that while some foundational intuitions related to harm and fairness exhibit cross-cultural universality, the moral psychology of intuition is deeply modulated by tradition-specific conceptions of social order, kinship, and spiritual cultivation. Recommendations include expanding cross-cultural training for ethics educators, refining cross-cultural measurement scales to enhance invariance across contexts, and pursuing longitudinal studies to examine the stability of intuitive judgments in relation to shifting cultural norms and globalization pressures.