Initial development and psychometric characteristics of the moral cognition inventory

The need for a measure that encompasses the various components of moral decision-making has become increasingly apparent as different areas of psychology, particularly cognitive neuroscience, focus more time and resources on how people make moral choices. My ultimate purpose is to develop the Moral Cognition Inventory (MCI), a comprehensive measure of moral cognition that will facilitate investigation of the construct's distinct aspects. The MCI will include four components, Responsibility, Identity, Cognition, and Community. The primary objective of this research was to validate the first two scales, Moral Responsibility and Moral Identity, and to test a partial structural model. Three surveys were offered through Survey Monkey. The first included the MCI and eight validation measures. The second included the MCI and the Defining Issues Test 2. The third was a brief retest survey. A sample of over 450 participants (mean age = 35.5) recruited through the HSU Psychology Department Research Participation pool and via online social networking completed the MCI and one or more of the validation scales. The Moral Identity Scale, which measures the salience of integrity and moral values within a person's character, proved reliable (rα = .90, N = 438) and valid, with strong correlations to measures of similar constructs. The Moral Responsibility Scale (rα = .86, N = 389) with its three subscales, Moral Agency, Identification, and Consequences, assesses a range of moral behavior; hypotheses related to its validity were similarly confirmed, although CFA demonstrated a need to perfect the scale. Structural Equation Modeling of MCI constructs was a success: the hypothesized model was a good fit, and other similar models were excellent. Further model testing in different populations is needed to finalize model selection.