Luppo Kuillman

Chapter 3 60 conscientiousness is plausible because conscientiousness is the propensity to follow socially prescribed norms for impulse control, to be goal-directed, to plan and to be able to delay gratification (Roberts et al. 2009). This means that people who comply with this definition of conscientiousness are not expected to morally disengage. Costa and McCrae stated that conscientious people tend to think carefully prior to acting and adhere to their moral obligations and perceived responsibilities (Costa & McCrae 1992). Furthermore, several studies that start from the standpoint of viewing moral disengagement as the counterpart to ethical behavior have found positive relationships between ethical behavior and the personality traits agreeableness, conscientiousness and emotional stability (reverse of neuroticism) (Brown & Treviño 2006, Walumbwa & Schaubroeck 2009). Moral reasoning and personality traits The personality traits associated with mechanisms of moral disengagement (e.g., openness, agreeableness, neuroticism, or conscientiousness) also correlate with moral reasoning. If, as Chovan suggests, moral reasoning is the process of how people think (denoted as a thinking style) once they are faced with moral dilemmas (Chovan 2007), then the relationship between personality and moral reasoning is plausible. Especially so, because Li-fang Zhang found significant relationships between thinking styles and personality traits (Zhang 2006). However, in considering moral reasoning to be a cognitive process, Mudrack concluded that a direct relationship with personality would not be reasonable (Mudrack 2006). In doing so, he referred to Rest et al. (1999): “Of approximately 150 correlations between the DIT and personality measures, most are non-significant” (Rest et al. 1999b) (p. 108). Nevertheless, in another study some statistically significant zero-order correlations ( p < .001) with an explained variance of 9% between moral reasoning (DIT) and the personality traits openness and conscientiousness were found (Dollinger & LaMartina 1998). This finding was confirmed in the study among students. Furthermore, Derryberry and colleagues observed a statistically significant, positive correlation ( r = .18 * ) between openness and post- conventional moral reasoning (Derryberry et al. 2005). Another study assessing the relationship between the Big Five personality traits and moral reasoning (Athota et al. 2009) found statistically significant correlations between an indicator of moral reasoning (assessed with the Mach IV) and the personality traits extraversion ( r = .28 ** ), agreeableness ( r = .23 **) , emotional stability ( r = .21 * ) and openness ( r = .41 ** ).