PROSOCIAL Virtual Seminar February
To register for the PROSOCIAL Virtual seminar on February 10th, 2026, at 2:30 PM (CET) please fill out the form below. You will receive an email that contains the link for joining the seminar.
Title of the presentation: Ends versus Means: Kantians, Utilitarians, and Moral Decisions
Speaker: Roland Bénabou (Princeton University)
Abstract: „ Choosing what is morally right can be based on the consequences (ends) resulting from the decision – the Consequentialist view – or on the conformity of the means involved with some overarching notion o duty – the Deontological view. Using a series of experiments, we investigate the overall prevalence and the consistency of consequentialist and deontological decision-making, when these two moral principles come into conflict. Our design includes a real-stakes version of the classical trolley dilemma, four novel games that induce ends-versus-means tradeoffs, and a rule-following task. These six main games are supplemented with six classical self-versus-other choice tasks, allowing us to relate consequentialist/deontological behavior to standard measures of prosociality. Across the six main games, we find a sizeable prevalence (20 to 44%) of deontological choices by subjects, but no evidence of stable individual preference types across situations. Instead, which moral principle prevails appears to be context-dependent. In contrast, we find a substantial level of consistency across self-versus-other decisions, but individuals’ degree of prosociality is unrelated to how they choose in ends-versus-means tradeoffs. In both types of decisions, subjects experience substantive normative uncertainty, as revealed by their willingness to randomize their choices when given the option to do so.”
Privacy Policy:
Your registration data will be used exclusively for registration and organization of the seminar. It will only be passed on to third parties if this is necessary for the event to take place or if required by law.
Recording of the seminar:
The seminar might be recorded and published on YouTube at a later date. We will inform about the recording at the beginning of the seminar. The recording will include the speaker's camera and microphone as well as the presentation slides. Whether and to what extent your data will be recorded depends on what data you disclose before or during participation. If you ask questions in person, these will also be included in the recording. Alternatively, you can ask your questions via chat function, which is not part of the recording and is moderated by the organizing team. This ensures that your privacy is protected.
Of course, you can revoke your consent at any time. For more information about how we handle your data, please refer to our privacy policy: Datenschutzerklaerung_PROSOCIAL_Virtual_Seminar.pdf
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