Though moral intuitions and choices seem fundamental to our core being, there is surprising new evidence that people resolve moral dilemmas differently when they consider them in a foreign language (Cipolletti et al., 2016; Costa et al., 2014a; Geipel et al., 2015): People are more willing to sacrifice 1 person to save 5 when they use a foreign language compared with when they use their native tongue. Our findings show that the phenomenon is robust across various contexts and that multiple factors affect it, such as the severity of the negative consequences associated with saving the larger group. This has also allowed us to better describe the phenomenon and investigate potential explanations. Together, our results suggest that the foreign language effect is most likely attributable to an increase in psychological distance and a reduction in emotional response.

This research was partially funded by grants from the Spanish Government (PSI2011-23033, Consolider Ingenio 2010 CSD2007-00048, and Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness PSI2014-52181-P), from the Catalan Government (SGR 2009-1521), from the European Research Council under the European Community's Seventh Framework (FP7/2007-2013 Cooperation grant agreement 613465-AThEME), from the John Templeton Foundation and the National Science Foundation #1520074 to the University of Chicago. Joanna D. Corey was supported by a grant from the Catalan Government (FI-DGR).