Title: Moral disengagement - Wikipedia
Headings: Moral disengagement
Moral disengagement
Contents
Mechanisms
Moral justification
Euphemistic labelling
Advantageous comparison
Displacement of responsibility
Diffusion of responsibility
Disregarding or misrepresenting injurious consequences
Dehumanization
Antecedents
Individual differences
Interplay of personal and social sanctions
Consequences
Unethical decision making and deceptive behavior
Military conduct
Aggression
Moral disengagement in routinely performed self-serving activities
See also
References
External links

Content: Generally, moral standards are adopted to serve as guides for good behavior and as deterrents for bad conduct. Once internalized control has developed, people regulate their actions by the standards they apply to themselves and this give them self-satisfaction and a sense of self-worth. Individuals refrain from behaving in ways that violate their moral standards in order to avoid self-condemnation. Therefore, self-sanctions play a significant role in keeping conduct in line with these internal moral standards and hence also in regulating inhumane conduct. However, moral standards only function as fixed internal regulators of conduct when self-regulatory mechanisms have been activated. Many different social and psychological processes prevent the activation of self-sanction. Selective activation of self-sanctions and internal moral control or disengagement allows for a wide range of behaviour, given the same moral standard. Moral disengagement functions in the perpetration of inhumanities through moral justification, euphemistic labelling, advantageous comparison, displacing or diffusing responsibility, disregarding or misrepresenting injurious consequences, and dehumanising the victim. Rather than operating independently, these cognitive mechanisms are interrelated within a sociostructural context to promote inhumane conduct in people's daily lives. Contents
1 Mechanisms
1.1 Moral justification
1.2 Euphemistic labelling
1.3 Advantageous comparison
1.4 Displacement of responsibility
1.5 Diffusion of responsibility
1.6 Disregarding or misrepresenting injurious consequences
1.7 Dehumanization
2 Antecedents
2.1 Individual differences
2.2 Interplay of personal and social sanctions
3 Consequences
3.1 Unethical decision making and deceptive behavior
3.2 Military conduct
3.3 Aggression
3.4 Moral disengagement in routinely performed self-serving activities
4 See also
5 References
6 External links
Mechanisms
Moral justification
One method of disengagement is portraying inhumane behavior as though it has a moral purpose in order to make it socially acceptable.