A new series of studies has identified a fundamental difference in moral philosophy that helps explain why political conservatives are often more supportive of banning practices they find immoral compared to liberals with similar moral views. The research, published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, suggests that conservatives are more inclined to see morality as universal and absolute, while liberals tend to view it as relative and context-dependent. This basic difference in worldview predicts an individual’s willingness to translate personal moral opposition into support for legal prohibitions.
The research was prompted by observations from public opinion polls. For example, among Americans who believe abortion is wrong, Republicans are significantly more likely than Democrats to support making it illegal in all cases. A similar pattern appears on other issues, such as recreational marijuana use. This raised a question for researchers: why would two people who see a practice as equally wrong arrive at different conclusions about whether it should be banned?
Past explanations, which focused on the different values liberals and conservatives prioritize, did not fully resolve the issue, as studies have shown both groups can hold their respective moral convictions with equal strength. The authors of the new paper proposed a novel theory, suggesting the answer lies not in what people believe is immoral, but in their underlying beliefs about the nature of morality itself.
“As a cultural and social psychologist, I learned early on that my field has long wrestled with a fundamental question: is morality entirely a product of culture, or are there certain moral truths that transcend it? I first encountered this debate as a PhD student, and it’s lingered with me ever since,” said study author Namrata Goyal, an assistant professor at Esade Business School.
“But, in recent years, as political polarization has deepened, this philosophical question has become deeply personal. I’ve often found myself in political debates with family and friends that reach an impasse, not because we disagree on evidence, but because we begin from different moral premises. Some people see morality as fluid and context-bound; others experience it as absolute, fixed, universal. I realized that differences in political opinions often aren’t political, they’re philosophical. And that realization ultimately became the spark for this research.”
To investigate this, the researchers conducted a series of nine studies. The first study analyzed millions of tweets to see if ideological differences appeared in everyday language. The team identified Twitter users who exclusively followed either Republican or Democratic political accounts, classifying them as conservative and liberal, respectively. They then analyzed the language in their tweets, sorting them into those containing moral content and those that did not.
The researchers found that conservatives used more absolute words, such as “always,” “never,” and “every,” than liberals did. This difference was about twice as large in tweets that contained moral language compared to non-moral tweets, providing initial evidence that conservatives approach moral topics with a more absolutist framework.
A second study broadened the scope by using a massive international dataset. Analyzing responses from the World Values Survey, which included nearly 100,000 people across 59 countries over a 30-year period, the researchers examined how people’s political orientation related to their moral philosophy. Participants were asked to choose between two statements: one reflecting moral absolutism (“There are absolutely clear guidelines about what is good and evil”) and another reflecting moral relativism (“What is good and evil depends entirely upon the circumstances”).
The results showed that individuals who identified as more conservative were consistently more likely to endorse the moral absolutist position, a finding that held even after accounting for factors like age, gender, religiosity, and socioeconomic status.
With this connection established, the researchers next explored a potential psychological mechanism behind it. They proposed that conservatives’ preference for moral absolutism might stem from a greater “need for closure,” a psychological preference for clear, unambiguous answers and a desire to avoid uncertainty. The third study tested this by surveying American participants on their political ideology, their need for closure, and their position on moral absolutism. The findings indicated that need for closure did indeed help explain the link between being politically conservative and endorsing a more absolutist view of morality.
To provide stronger evidence for this mechanism, a fourth study used an experimental design. Goyal and her colleagues placed some participants under time pressure when they were asked to respond to moral statements, a technique known to temporarily increase the need for closure. As predicted, participants who were rushed were more likely to agree with morally absolute statements compared to those in a control group who had no time limit. This experiment provided causal evidence that a heightened need for definitive answers pushes people toward a more absolutist moral stance.
The subsequent studies examined the real-world consequences of this philosophical divide, focusing on support for banning politicized practices. In a fifth study, participants rated how immoral they found 11 different practices, some typically opposed by liberals (like gun ownership), some opposed by conservatives (like abortion), and some opposed by both (like bribery). They were then asked whether they supported banning each practice.
The results showed that for all participants, viewing a practice as more immoral was linked to greater support for banning it. However, this connection was significantly stronger for conservatives. They were more likely to generalize their personal moral judgments into a desire for society-wide prohibition.
To confirm that moral absolutism was the specific factor driving this effect, a sixth study tested it against several alternative psychological explanations. The researchers measured participants’ political ideology and their support for banning only the practices they personally opposed. They also measured their tendency toward rule-based thinking, their focus on avoiding negative outcomes, and the importance they placed on different moral values like loyalty and fairness.
The analysis showed that moral absolutism was the primary factor that explained why conservatives were more likely than liberals to support banning practices they opposed. The other potential explanations did not show a similar explanatory power.
A seventh study added another layer of rigor by considering the strength of people’s attitudes. It is possible that conservatives support bans more because their opposition to certain practices is simply more intense, certain, or central to their identity. The researchers measured these dimensions of attitude strength for several contentious issues.
Even after statistically controlling for attitude intensity, certainty, centrality, and importance, the results remained the same. Moral absolutism continued to explain the ideological difference in support for bans on practices that people found objectionable. In other words, support for banning immoral practices appears to be driven by one’s moral philosophy rather than political ideology, with moral absolutists more likely to favor such bans.
“One surprising finding was that conservatives, on average, weren’t more supportive of bans than liberals,” Goyal told PsyPost. “The real divide wasn’t political, it was philosophical. Once we accounted for people’s moral philosophy, those differences largely disappeared. It was striking to see that a liberal who thinks in absolute moral terms can look very similar to a conservative moral absolutist in their willingness to restrict behaviors they see as wrong. That really drove home how deeply our underlying moral outlook shapes our judgments, often more than our politics do.”
The final two studies shifted from observation to intervention, testing whether people’s support for bans could be changed by nudging their moral perspective. In the eighth study, the researchers had participants read about a fictional foreign culture that was described as either morally absolutist or morally relativist. This exposure subtly influenced the participants’ own thinking.
The results showed that both liberals and conservatives who were exposed to the idea of moral relativism showed significantly less support for banning practices they were against, compared to those exposed to moral absolutism.
The ninth and final study took this experiment into the real world. The researchers created an actual petition on Change.org to ban hunting. Participants first read a series of fake social media comments about the issue that were framed in either morally absolute or morally relative terms. They were then given the opportunity to sign the petition. People who had been exposed to the morally relative comments were significantly less likely to sign the real petition than those who had read the absolutist comments.
“Our findings show that liberals and conservatives don’t just differ in what they value, but also in how they think those values should be applied. Liberals tend to view morality as more flexible and context-dependent, while conservatives are more likely to see it as fixed and absolute,” Goyal explained.
“What’s especially interesting is that people’s moral philosophy (whether they see morality as absolute or relative) actually predicts their attitudes better than political ideology does. Moral absolutists are more likely to support bans on behaviors they find morally wrong, whereas moral relativists, even when they care deeply about an issue, are less inclined to favor outright bans. In other words, it’s not just what you believe that matters, but how you think about morality itself.”
The research is not without its limitations. “Our research focused mainly on the liberal–conservative divide, but there are other ways to organize political beliefs,” Goyal noted. “Future work should explore how moral absolutism and relativism align with alternative ideological dimensions such as libertarianism vs authoritarianism, for example.”
“I’m leading a line of research on moral absolutism versus relativism, essentially, why some people see morality in black-and-white terms while others see shades of gray. My coauthors and I have found that this isn’t just about opinions; it reflects a deep psychological difference in how people view the world. Looking ahead, our goal is to understand what shapes these moral outlooks and how they influence everyday choices, from financial decisions to attitudes toward immigration and social issues. Ultimately, we hope this work can help bridge divides in increasingly polarized societies by shedding light on how people with very different moral lenses can still find common ground.”
The findings provide a framework for understanding one of the most persistent divides in modern politics: whether personal moral judgments should be private guides or universal rules. However, the research should not be misinterpreted as an argument for one philosophy over the other.
“One philosophy isn’t better than the other,” Goyal told PsyPost. “I’d hate for people to walk away thinking moral absolutism is ‘bad’ or moral relativism is ‘good.’ Each has its strengths and weaknesses. Moral absolutism can provide clarity, consistency, and a strong sense of conviction, it helps people stand firm for what they believe is right, even under pressure. Moral relativism, on the other hand, allows for openness, empathy, and flexibility, it helps people understand diverse perspectives and adapt to complex situations.”
“The point of the research isn’t to take sides, but to show that our moral outlook, whether absolute or relative, shapes how we approach disagreements and policy preferences. Understanding that difference can help us communicate across divides more effectively.”
The study, “Moral Absolutism Drives Support for Bans: Unpacking Ideological Differences in the Moral Philosophies of Conservatives and Liberals,” was authored by Namrata Goyal, Lorenzo De Gregori, Yuqi Liu, and Krishna Savani.
