Searching for the content and scope of morality with a framework of moral foundations theory

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Tezin Türü: Doktora

Tezin Yürütüldüğü Kurum: Orta Doğu Teknik Üniversitesi, Fen Edebiyat Fakültesi, Psikoloji Bölümü, Türkiye

Tezin Onay Tarihi: 2015

Öğrenci: BİLGE YALÇINDAĞ

Danışman: TÜRKER ÖZKAN

Özet:

What does morality entail? This question has been answered with a rather narrow outlook in psychological literature for years that is not harming and being fair. With the advance of research on emotions and neuroscience and taking the contribution of anthropological data into account, the understanding of morality has been quite expanded. Recent advances in different fields enabled a more comprehensive outlook to morality, specifically, moral foundations theory (MFT) claimed the existence of other additional moral principles, such as loyalty, authrority and sanctity. The aim of this thesis is of threefold: a) adapting the two questionnaires of MFT and testing the theory in Turkish, b) explore lay people’s understanding of morality and MFT, c) in light of these, offer two new questionnaires and updates for the MFT. It is hoped that the study would contribute to the developments in morality with qualitative and quantitative techniques. The implications of the results will be discussed.