Moral character or
character is an evaluation of a particular individual's durable
moralMorality is the differentiation among intentions, decisions, and actions between those that are good and bad . A moral code is a system of morality and a moral is any one practice or teaching within a moral code...
qualities. The concept of
character can imply a variety of attributes including the existence or lack of
virtueVirtue is moral excellence. A virtue is a positive trait or quality subjectively deemed to be morally excellent and thus is valued as a foundation of principle and good moral being....
s such as
integrityIntegrity is a concept of consistency of actions, values, methods, measures, principles, expectations, and outcomes. In ethics, integrity is regarded as the honesty and truthfulness or accuracy of one's actions...
,
courageCourage is the ability to confront fear, pain, danger, uncertainty, or intimidation...
, fortitude,
honestyHonesty refers to a facet of moral character and denotes positive, virtuous attributes such as integrity, truthfulness, and straightforwardness along with the absence of lying, cheating, or theft....
, and
loyaltyLoyalty is faithfulness or a devotion to a person, country, group, or cause There are many aspects to...
, or of good behaviors or
habitsHabits are routines of behavior that are repeated regularly and tend to occur subconsciously. Habitual behavior often goes unnoticed in persons exhibiting it, because a person does not need to engage in self-analysis when undertaking routine tasks...
. Moral character primarily refers to the assemblage of qualities that distinguish one individual from another — although on a cultural level, the set of moral behaviors to which a social group adheres can be said to unite and define it culturally as distinct from others. Psychologist Lawrence Pervin defines moral character as "a disposition to express behavior in consistent patterns of functions across a range of situations."
Overview
The "character" is word 'karaktEwr which was originally used of a
markMark may refer to:* Mark , a male given name* Mark -Business:* Service mark, trademark used to identify a service rather than a product...
impressed Later and more generally, it came to mean a point by which one thing was told apart from others. There are two approaches when dealing with moral character:
Normative ethicsNormative ethics is the study of ethical action. It is the branch of philosophical ethics that investigates the set of questions that arise when considering how one ought to act, morally speaking...
involve moral standards that exhibit right and wrong conduct. It is a test of proper behavior and determining what is right and wrong.
Applied ethicsApplied ethics is, in the words of Brenda Almond, co-founder of the Society for Applied Philosophy, "the philosophical examination, from a moral standpoint, of particular issues in private and public life that are matters of moral judgment"...
involve specific and controversial issues along with a moral choice, and tend to involve situations where people are either for or against the issue.
In 1996 V. Campbell and R. Bond proposed the following as major factors in influencing character and moral development:
heredityHeredity is the passing of traits to offspring . This is the process by which an offspring cell or organism acquires or becomes predisposed to the characteristics of its parent cell or organism. Through heredity, variations exhibited by individuals can accumulate and cause some species to evolve...
, early childhood experience,
modelingThe term role model generally means any "person who serves as an example, whose behaviour is emulated by others".The term first appeared in Robert K. Merton's socialization research of medical students...
by important adults and older youth, peer influence, no the generalf physical and
social environmentThe social environment of an individual, also called social context or milieu, is the culture that s/he was educated or lives in, and the people and institutions with whom the person interacts....
, the communications media, what is taught englsih in the schools and other institutions, and specific situations and roles that elicit corresponding behavior.
The field of
business ethicsBusiness ethics is a form of applied ethics or professional ethics that examines ethical principles and moral or ethical problems that arise in a business environment. It applies to all aspects of business conduct and is relevant to the conduct of individuals and entire organizations.Business...
examines moral controversies relating to the social responsibilities of capitalist business practices, the moral status of corporate entities, deceptive advertising,
insider tradingInsider trading is the trading of a corporation's stock or other securities by individuals with potential access to non-public information about the company...
, employee rights, job discrimination,
affirmative actionAffirmative action refers to policies that take factors including "race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation or national origin" into consideration in order to benefit an underrepresented group, usually as a means to counter the effects of a history of discrimination.-Origins:The term...
and drug testing.
Character. What is character? A dictionary describes character as the complex of mental and ethical traits marking a person. But really character is who we really are. It’s what we do. It’s the accumulation of thoughts, values, words and actions. These become the habits that determine our destiny. A persons destiny can be summed up to a road of success or a road of failure. People say you can achieve success by having good character. But what really is good character? A person of good character thinks right and does right according to the core universal values that define the qualities of a good person: trustworthiness, respect, responsibility, fairness, caring, and citizenship. Well whatever we shall call character, though our role as character developers is to guide people’s thoughts, words, actions, and habits toward these values, which all people share, regardless of differences.
History
The
Stanford Encyclopedia of PhilosophyThe Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy is a freely-accessible online encyclopedia of philosophy maintained by Stanford University. Each entry is written and maintained by an expert in the field, including professors from over 65 academic institutions worldwide...
provides a historical account of some important developments in philosophical approaches to moral character. A lot of attention is given to
PlatoPlato , was a Classical Greek philosopher, mathematician, student of Socrates, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world. Along with his mentor, Socrates, and his student, Aristotle, Plato helped to lay the...
,
AristotleAristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology...
, and
Karl MarxKarl Heinrich Marx was a German philosopher, economist, sociologist, historian, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. His ideas played a significant role in the development of social science and the socialist political movement...
's views, since they all follow the idea of moral character after the
GreeksThe Greeks, also known as the Hellenes , are a nation and ethnic group native to Greece, Cyprus and neighboring regions. They also form a significant diaspora, with Greek communities established around the world....
. Marx accepts Aristotle's insight that virtue and good character are based on a sense of
self-esteemSelf-esteem is a term in psychology to reflect a person's overall evaluation or appraisal of his or her own worth. Self-esteem encompasses beliefs and emotions such as triumph, despair, pride and shame: some would distinguish how 'the self-concept is what we think about the self; self-esteem, the...
and
self-confidenceThe socio-psychological concept of self-confidence relates to self-assuredness in one's personal judgment, ability, power, etc., sometimes manifested excessively.Being confident in yourself is infectious if you present yourself well, others will want to follow in your foot steps towards...
.
PlatoPlato , was a Classical Greek philosopher, mathematician, student of Socrates, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world. Along with his mentor, Socrates, and his student, Aristotle, Plato helped to lay the...
believed that the
soulA soul in certain spiritual, philosophical, and psychological traditions is the incorporeal essence of a person or living thing or object. Many philosophical and spiritual systems teach that humans have souls, and others teach that all living things and even inanimate objects have souls. The...
is divided into three parts of desire:
RationalIn philosophy, rationality is the exercise of reason. It is the manner in which people derive conclusions when considering things deliberately. It also refers to the conformity of one's beliefs with one's reasons for belief, or with one's actions with one's reasons for action...
, Appetitive, or Spirited. In order to have moral character, we must understand what contributes to our overall good and have our spirited and appetitive desires educated properly, so that they can agree with the guidance provided by the rational part of the soul.
AristotleAristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology...
tells us that there are two different kinds of human
excellenceExcellence is a talent or quality which is unusually good and so surpasses ordinary standards. It is also an aimed for standard of performance.-History:...
s, excellences of
thought"Thought" generally refers to any mental or intellectual activity involving an individual's subjective consciousness. It can refer either to the act of thinking or the resulting ideas or arrangements of ideas. Similar concepts include cognition, sentience, consciousness, and imagination...
and excellences of character. His phrase for excellences of character —
êthikai aretai — we usually translate as moral virtue or moral excellence. When we speak of a moral
virtueVirtue is moral excellence. A virtue is a positive trait or quality subjectively deemed to be morally excellent and thus is valued as a foundation of principle and good moral being....
or an excellence of character, the emphasis is on the combination of qualities that make an individual the sort of ethically admirable person that he is. Aristotle defines virtuous character at the beginning of Book II in
Nicomachean EthicsThe Nicomachean Ethics is the name normally given to Aristotle's best known work on ethics. The English version of the title derives from Greek Ἠθικὰ Νικομάχεια, transliterated Ethika Nikomacheia, which is sometimes also given in the genitive form as Ἠθικῶν Νικομαχείων, Ethikōn Nikomacheiōn...
: “Excellence of character, then, is a state concerned with choice, lying in a
meanIn statistics, mean has two related meanings:* the arithmetic mean .* the expected value of a random variable, which is also called the population mean....
relative to us, this being determined by reason and in the way in which the man of practical wisdom would determine it. Now it is a mean between two vices, that which depends on
excessExcess may refer to:* Angle excess, in spherical trigonometry, quantity, used to calculate the area of polygon on a sphere* Excess, in insurance, similar to deductible* Excess, in chemistry, describing any reagent that is not the limiting reagent...
and that which depends on
defect- Geometry and physical sciences :* Defect , a characteristic of a polyhedron* Topological defect* Isoperimetric defect* Crystallographic defect, a structural imperfection in a crystal- Pop music :* The Defects, Northern-Irish punk rock band...
”. In Aristotle's view, good character is based on two naturally occurring psychological responses which most people experience without difficulty: our tendency to take
pleasurePleasure describes the broad class of mental states that humans and other animals experience as positive, enjoyable, or worth seeking. It includes more specific mental states such as happiness, entertainment, enjoyment, ecstasy, and euphoria...
from self-realizing activity and our tendency to form friendly feelings toward others under specific circumstances. Based on his view, virtually everyone is capable of becoming better and they are the ones responsible for actions that express (or could express) their character.
Abraham LincolnAbraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...
once said, "Character is like a
treeA tree is a perennial woody plant. It is most often defined as a woody plant that has many secondary branches supported clear of the ground on a single main stem or trunk with clear apical dominance. A minimum height specification at maturity is cited by some authors, varying from 3 m to...
and
reputationReputation of a social entity is an opinion about that entity, typically a result of social evaluation on a set of criteria...
like its
shadowA shadow is an area where direct light from a light source cannot reach due to obstruction by an object. It occupies all of the space behind an opaque object with light in front of it. The cross section of a shadow is a two-dimensional silhouette, or reverse projection of the object blocking the...
. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing."
Biblical definition
The
BibleThe Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
defines character as any behavior or activity that reflects the character of
GodGod is the English name given to a singular being in theistic and deistic religions who is either the sole deity in monotheism, or a single deity in polytheism....
. The Book of Genesis says that God created man in his own image. Modern
ChristianA Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...
TheologyTheology is the systematic and rational study of religion and its influences and of the nature of religious truths, or the learned profession acquired by completing specialized training in religious studies, usually at a university or school of divinity or seminary.-Definition:Augustine of Hippo...
states that this means that humans are created to act in accordance to the will of their creator. In general, Christians believe that this means that the morally correct thing to do is reflect the character of the creator.
Christian character is also defined as exibiting the "Fruits of the Spirit" as defined in the Bible, specifically in Galatians 5:22-23 "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law." (ref name=Galatians 5:22-23/>
Scientific experiments disputing the existence of moral character
The
Milgram experimentThe Milgram experiment on obedience to authority figures was a series of notable social psychology experiments conducted by Yale University psychologist Stanley Milgram, which measured the willingness of study participants to obey an authority figure who instructed them to perform acts that...
was a study done in the early
1960sThe 1960s was the decade that started on January 1, 1960, and ended on December 31, 1969. It was the seventh decade of the 20th century.The 1960s term also refers to an era more often called The Sixties, denoting the complex of inter-related cultural and political trends across the globe...
that helped measure a person's moral character. Subjects from different socio-economic groups were tested on their willingness to press a
buzzerA buzzer or beeper is an audio signaling device, which may be mechanical, electromechanical, or piezoelectric. Typical uses of buzzers and beepers include alarm devices, timers and confirmation of user input such as a mouse click or keystroke....
that caused a participant— posing as a subject— in another room to express great
painPain is an unpleasant sensation often caused by intense or damaging stimuli such as stubbing a toe, burning a finger, putting iodine on a cut, and bumping the "funny bone."...
and distress for giving a wrong answer to a test question. When the subjects raised questions about what they are being asked to do, the
experimenterAn experiment is a methodical procedure carried out with the goal of verifying, falsifying, or establishing the validity of a hypothesis. Experiments vary greatly in their goal and scale, but always rely on repeatable procedure and logical analysis of the results...
applied mild pressure in the form of appealing to the need to complete the experiment. The Milgram experiment caused a huge amount of criticism among individuals. In post-experiment interviews with subjects Milgram noted that many were completely convinced of the wrongness of what they were doing. Although the subjects may have had moral values, many were criticized on whether they were a truly moral character.
In one experiment that was done, the moral character of a person was based on whether or not a person had found a
dimeThe dime is a coin 10 cents, one tenth of a United States dollar, labeled formally as "one dime". The denomination was first authorized by the Coinage Act of 1792. The dime is the smallest in diameter and is the thinnest of all U.S...
in a public phone booth. The findings were that 87% of subjects who found a dime in a phone booth helped somebody in need, while only 4% of those who did not find a dime helped. Some found it very troubling that people would be influenced by such morally trivial factors in their choice whether to provide low-cost
assistanceIn international relations, aid is a voluntary transfer of resources from one country to another, given at least partly with the objective of benefiting the recipient country....
to others. John M. Doris raises the issue of
ecological validityEcological validity is a form of validity in a research study. For a research study to possess ecological validity, the methods, materials and setting of the study must approximate the real-life situation that is under investigation. Unlike internal and external validity, ecological validity is not...
—do experimental findings reflect phenomena found in natural
contextContext may refer to:* Context , the relevant constraints of the communicative situation that influence language use, language variation, and discourse summary...
s. He recognizes that these results are
counterintuitiveThe word "counterintuitive" literally means counter to intuition, and so it essentially means that something does not seem right or correct.A counterintuitive proposition is one that does not seem likely to be true when assessed using intuition or gut feelings...
to the way most of us think about morally relevant behavior.
Another experiment that was done that asked college students at Cornell to predict how they would behave when faced with one of several moral dilemmas, and to make the same
predictionA prediction or forecast is a statement about the way things will happen in the future, often but not always based on experience or knowledge...
s for their
peerA peer group is a social group consisting of humans. Peer groups are an informal primary group of people who share a similar or equal status and who are usually of roughly the same age, tended to travel around and interact within the social aggregate Members of a particular peer group often have...
s. Again and again, people predicted that they would be more
generousGenerous is an adjective form of generosity.Generous may also refer to:*Generous , an Irish thoroughbred racehorse*Generous Stakes, an American thoroughbred horse race*Matt Generous , an American ice hockey defenseman...
and
kindKindness is the act or the state of being kind, being marked by good and charitable behaviour, pleasant disposition, and concern for others. It is known as a virtue, and recognized as a value in many cultures and religions ....
than others. Yet when the time came to put their
moneyMoney is any object or record that is generally accepted as payment for goods and services and repayment of debts in a given country or socio-economic context. The main functions of money are distinguished as: a medium of exchange; a unit of account; a store of value; and, occasionally in the past,...
where their mouths were, most kept their
walletA wallet, or billfold, is a small, flat case that is used to carry personal items such as cash, credit cards, identification documents , photographs, business cards and other paper or laminated cards...
in their
pocketA pocket is a bag- or envelope-like receptacle either fastened to or inserted in an article of clothing to hold small items. Pockets may also be attached to luggage, backpacks, and similar items...
s. In psychological terms, the experimental subjects were successfully anticipating the base rate of moral behavior and accurately predicting how often others, in general, would be self-sacrificing.
Criticism
Recently, a number of philosophers and social scientists have begun to question the very presuppositions that theories of moral character and moral character traits are based on. Due to the importance of moral character to issues in
philosophyPhilosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...
, it is unlikely that the debates over the nature of moral character will disappear anytime soon.
Situationism can be understood as composed of three central claims:
Non-robustness Claim: moral character traits are not consistent across a wide spectrum of trait-relevant situations. Whatever moral character traits an individual has are situation specific.
Consistency Claim: while a person’s moral character traits are relatively stable over time, this should be understood as consistency of situation specific traits, rather than robust traits.
Fragmentation-In biology:* Fragmentation , a form of asexual reproduction* Fragmentation * Habitat fragmentation* Population fragmentation-Music:* Fragmented , the debut album from the Filipino independent band Up Dharma Down-Other:...
Claim: a person’s moral character traits do not have the evaluative
integrityIntegrity is a concept of consistency of actions, values, methods, measures, principles, expectations, and outcomes. In ethics, integrity is regarded as the honesty and truthfulness or accuracy of one's actions...
suggested by the Integrity Claim. There may be considerable disunity in a person’s moral character among her situation-specific character traits.
According to Situationists, the
empiricalThe word empirical denotes information gained by means of observation or experimentation. Empirical data are data produced by an experiment or observation....
evidence favors their view of moral character over the Traditional View. Hugh Hartshorne and M. A. May’s study of the trait of
honestyHonesty refers to a facet of moral character and denotes positive, virtuous attributes such as integrity, truthfulness, and straightforwardness along with the absence of lying, cheating, or theft....
among school children found no cross-situational
correlationIn statistics, dependence refers to any statistical relationship between two random variables or two sets of data. Correlation refers to any of a broad class of statistical relationships involving dependence....
. A child may be consistently honest with his
friendsFriends is an American sitcom created by David Crane and Marta Kauffman, which aired on NBC from September 22, 1994 to May 6, 2004. The series revolves around a group of friends in Manhattan. The series was produced by Bright/Kauffman/Crane Productions, in association with Warner Bros. Television...
, but not with his parents or
teachersTeachers may refer to:* Teachers, people who provide schooling for pupils and students* Teachers , one of the five Ascension Gift Ministries* Teachers , a British sitcom* Teachers Teachers may refer to:* Teachers, people who provide schooling for pupils and students* Teachers (ministry), one of the...
. From this and other studies, Hartshorne and May concluded that character traits are not robust but rather “specific functions of life situations”
A second challenge to the traditional view can be found in the idea of moral
luckLuck or fortuity is good fortune which occurs beyond one's control, without regard to one's will, intention, or desired result. There are at least two senses people usually mean when they use the term, the prescriptive sense and the descriptive sense...
. This idea is that moral luck occurs when the moral judgment of an
agentMoral agency is a person's ability to make moral judgments and take action that comport with morality.A Moral agent is "a being who is capable of acting with reference to right and wrong"-Development and analysis:...
depends on factors beyond the agent’s control. There are number of ways that moral luck can motivate criticisms of moral character. It is similar to “the kind of problems and situations one faces” If all of an agent’s moral character traits are situation-specific rather than robust, what traits an agent manifests will depend on the situation that she finds herself in. But what situations an agent finds herself in is often beyond her control and thus a matter of situational luck. Whether moral character traits are robust or situation-specific, some have suggested that what character traits one has is itself a matter of luck. If our having certain traits is itself a matter of luck, this would seem to undermine one’s moral responsibility for one’s moral character, and thus the concept of moral character altogether. As
Owen FlanaganOwen Flanagan, Ph.D. is the James B. Duke Professor of Philosophy and Professor of Neurobiology at Duke University. Flanagan has done work in philosophy of mind, philosophy of psychology, philosophy of social science, ethics, contemporary ethical theory, moral psychology, as well as Buddhist and...
and Amélie Oksenberg Rorty write::