Materials

Following an attention check, participants were presented with both vignettes of Study 1b (the order was fixed: bad luck first). The formulation of the wrongness, blame, permissibility, and punishment questions differed from Study 1b. In Study 2, participants were presented with statements explicitly comparing Anna and Beth with respect to each of the four moral measures: (1) It was just as wrong for Anna to leave her son as it was for Beth. (2) Anna is just as blameworthy as Beth for leaving her son. (3) It was just as impermissible for Anna to leave her son as it was for Beth. (4) Anna deserves just as much punishment as Beth for leaving her son. Each statement (presented in randomized order) was followed by a 7-point Likert scale anchored at 1 with “completely agree” and at 7 with “completely disagree.”