Disrupting Intergenerational Mistreatment Through Moral Outrage

In this article we explore how moral outrage can play a role in disrupting the cycle of allocating burdens to future generations. Drawing on the literature on intergenerational reciprocity, we posit that individuals will generally reciprocate the good or bad treatment they received from previous generations to future generations and how cycles of mistreatment might be disrupted. Integrating existing knowledge on moral emotions, we propose that only when individuals are high on equity sensitivity will their feelings of moral outrage disrupt the intergenerational cycle of mistreatment. When individuals are low in equity sensitivity, mistreatment to future others is more likely to continue. The results of an experiment with working professionals support our hypotheses; as such, our research sheds light on the affective dynamics that can drive intergenerational allocations.