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Imagine that Bob wishes to kill his uncle in order to receive an inheritance. Bob makes a plan to go to his uncle’s house and shoot him. But first, he decides to clean his gun in front of his house. Unbeknownst to Bob, the gun is loaded. While cleaning the gun, Bob thinks to himself how great it would be to have the inheritance money. Suddenly, the gun accidentally fires and the bullet hits a pedestrian walking down the street, killing the pedestrian instantly. Bob runs over and discovers that the pedestrian is his uncle.
How responsible is Bob for the death of his uncle? Clearly he had the motive and the desire, and he did cause his uncle’s death. He even used the planned murder weapon. According to several legal definitions of murder, that is enough. But mostly likely, as you consider this scenario something doesn’t sit right. Something is preventing you from throwing the book at Bob. What is it?
Psychologists have called this sort of scenario “causally deviant”; the desired end was attained through unplanned means. Previous studies have found that, in general, people rate the actor in causally deviant scenarios less responsible than the actor in scenarios where the event transpired according to plan (Pizarro, Uhlmann, & Bloom, 2003).
In a 2009 article, my colleagues and I suggested that there are multiple varieties of causal deviance. We can derive these different varieties by considering the presence or absence of two ingredients, what we call “distal intent” and “proximal intent”. Distal intent refers to the actor consciously performing the act as a means to an end. Proximal intent refers to the exertion of conscious control in performing the critical action (i.e., doing it ‘on purpose’). Put differently, with distal intent, the actor’s focus is on accomplishing a larger goal, beyond the act itself; with proximal intent, the actor’s focus is on executing the act itself.
For many if not most intentional acts, both forms of intent go hand in hand. But sometimes the two can be decoupled. In the Bob example above, distal intent (Bob’s thoughts regarding the ultimate aim - the inheritance money) was present but proximal intent (thinking about executing the death blow) was absent. One could also imagine the opposite scenario: distal intent absent (Bob’s thoughts are on cleaning the gun’s trigger mechanism) but proximal intent present (he intentionally pulled the trigger). How much blame does Bob deserve in these two causally deviant cases?
It turns out, people rate Bob’s responsibility to be midway between fully intentional (both present) and fully unintentional (both absent). Intentionality is not an all-or-nothing proposition; people are sensitive to gradations of intent.
More interesting to us, however, was the question of what, if anything, causes people to place more emphasis on the actor’s deep dark thoughts versus whether act was executed with consciousness and control. We hypothesized that this could depend on what sort of theory about the human mind you are using. On the one hand, you may adopt a psychodynamic approach and believe that there is a slippery slope between thought and action. This is a very prevalent idea in Western society - e.g., “Freudian slips”. According to this model, one’s deepest desires always leak out in one form or another. On the other hand, you may adopt the approach that we can exercise control over our thoughts and behavior. Merely having a deep, dark thought doesn’t mean it will inevitably turn into an action. Although it is certainly difficult, the fact is that people often do resist temptation and say “no” to that extra helping of chocolate cake.
In one study, we randomly assigned participants to read one of two mock scientific articles. One contained text in favor of the psychodynamic approach (e.g., “No thought or desire stays unexpressed for long.”). The other article contained text in favor of control (e.g., “Humans are unique among animals in their ability to refrain from acting on every desire.”). Then participants read one of four scenarios like the ones involving Bob (both distal and proximal intent present, distal intent only, proximal intent only, or both absent).
We found that when distal intent was present and proximal intent was absent, those who read the ‘psychodynamic’ article rated the actor more responsible than those with the cognitive control theory. We believe this was because according to the psychodynamic model, desires inexorably slip into actions; therefore, simply having the malevolent goal in mind at the time of the act is sufficient grounds for punishment. In contrast, from the control perspective, the outcome may be regarded as more of an unfortunate coincidence. On the other hand, when proximal intent was present and distal intent was absent, this pattern reversed: those who read the ‘cognitive control’ article rated the actor more responsible than those with the psychodynamic theory. It was as if those primed with control were so impressed that the intentionally performed action caused the death that they failed to account for the fact that it was performed without input from the prior goal.
What are we to make of all this? Many moral judgments boil down to inferences about the actor’s mental state during the act in question. Indeed, the legal definitions of many criminal offenses, including homicide and rape, involve not only the act and its consequences (actus reus, or “guilty action”), but also the accompanying beliefs and goals of the actor (mens rea, or “guilty mind”).
Our research beings to identify beliefs that shift people toward emphasizing actus reus versus mens rea. Consider that an attorney may invoke psychodynamic language to imply a permeable boundary between thought and action, while his or her counterpart may attempt to strengthen that boundary through the language of cognitive control. It may be helpful for judges’ instructions to jurors to include the advice to be on the alert for such tactics.
Some questions for future research: Does the pattern differ for other types of crimes (e.g., white collar crimes, tort cases)? Does the pattern differ for sins of commission versus sins of omission? Do perceivers from different religious or cultural traditions place differential emphases on proximal and distal intent? Do perceivers use proximal and distal intent in the same way when they are determining how much praise to give for positive actions?
References:
Pizzaro, D.A., Uhlmann, E. & Bloom, P. (2003). Causal deviance and the attribution of moral responsibility. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 39, 653-660.
Plaks, J.E., McNichols, N.K., & Fortune, J.L. (2009). Thoughts versus deeds: Distal and proximal intent in lay judgments of moral responsibility. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 35, 1687-1701.
