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Abstract

In the target article, Dahl (this issue) argues for the importance of a definition of morality to guide research in moral psychology. He suggests the definition need not be definitive or universally agreed upon, but should be stated explicitly. This is so that researchers drawing on or contributing to psychological research on morality can understand one another’s hypotheses, results, and interpretations, and generate knowledge that can be readily integrated and accumulated. Dahl finds that morality is often left undefined, or else defined in ways that are problematic. He thus offers a new definition—or perhaps a synthesis and refinement of prior definitions—in which morality is understood as “obligatory concerns with others’ welfare, rights, fairness, and justice, as well as the reasoning, judgment, emotions, and actions that spring from those concerns” (Dahl, this issue, p. 53). In this commentary, we offer some thoughts and reflections on this definition of morality from the vantage of personality psychology.