Omission and Compromise: The Sacredness of Moral Foundations in Political Groups in Italy

Sacred values are moral foundations that may make public and political debates among groups hard to resolve. A taboo trade-off
framework offers the opportunity of measuring the inviolability and the “sacralization” of moral foundations. In this study, moral foundations
in a taboo trade-off framework were assessed in a convenience sample of Italians (N = 224) using a new measure to assess sacred values,
the Omission as a Compromise on Moral Foundations scale (OC-MF). The OC-MF measures the willingness of individuals to omit moral
foundations in exchange for money. It was predicted that Italian center and left-wing participants would be less willing to compromise
individualizing moral foundations as opposed to binding ones, and that center and right-wing participants would be less willing to
compromise on binding moral foundations than left-wing participants. Confirmatory Factor Analyses demonstrated the two-factor structure
of the OC-MF: individualizing and binding. As predicted, Repeated Measures Anova showed that political orientation was related with
differential adoptions of moral foundations as sacred values, with center and left-wing participants refusing to compromise more on
individualizing than on binding moral foundations. Moreover, left-wing participants were more willing to compromise on binding moral
foundations than center and right-wing participants. The OC-MF shows the hypothesized differences between Italian political groups and
offers a new understanding of moral reasoning. These findings provide opportunities for improving ideological debates concerning sacred
values.