Moral Disengagement
Updated 2026-08-02
INTRODUCTION
English translation pending.
CORE DEFINITION
Proposed by Albert Bandura, moral disengagement describes the cognitive mechanisms through which people suspend their internal moral standards, allowing harmful conduct without self-condemnation. The mechanisms include moral justification, euphemistic labeling, displacement and diffusion of responsibility, distortion of consequences, and dehumanization of victims. They allow people with intact moral standards to act against those standards in specific contexts. Key qualification: disengagement is selective rather than global, and the same person may apply full moral standards elsewhere.
SCAFFOLDING EFFECT
Reduce cognitive load
- Catch the language: listen for euphemisms that rename harm as something neutral. - Trace the responsibility: ask who is actually accountable when it is spread across many people. - Restore the victim: bring the affected person's concrete experience back into the discussion.
Anchor fast decisions
Self-sanction normally prevents harmful action by anticipating guilt, so disengagement works by interrupting the link between the act and the self-evaluation. Renaming the act, spreading responsibility, or minimizing the consequences removes the material that self-sanction needs. Once the act no longer registers as harmful, the person can proceed without experiencing conflict.
MINIMUM ACTION
In progress 0/1Practice this model in one real situation:
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Source support: Explicit
- en.wikipedia.orghttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_disengagementverified
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