Damage to the prefrontal cortex increases utilitarian moral judgements

M Koenigs, L Young, R Adolphs, D Tranel, F Cushman, M Hauser, & Antonio Damasio. Nature 446 (7138), 908-911

The psychological and neurobiological processes underlying moral judgement have been the focus of many recent empirical studies. Of central interest is whether emotions play a causal role in moral judgement, and, in parallel, how emotion-related areas of the brain contribute to moral judgement. Here we show that six patients with focal bilateral damage to the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (VMPC), a brain region necessary for the normal generation of emotions and, in particular, social emotions,,, produce an abnormally ‘utilitarian’ pattern of judgements on moral dilemmas that pit compelling considerations of aggregate welfare against highly emotionally aversive behaviours (for example, having to sacrifice one person’s life to save a number of other lives),. In contrast, the VMPC patients’ judgements were normal in other classes of moral dilemmas.