PETER FROST: Compliance with moral norms: a partly heritable trait?
Apparently some people are more norm-compliant than others. This is the conclusion of a recent twin study from Sweden (Loewen et al., 2013) [PDF]. . . .
The jury is still out, but it looks like compliance with moral norms has a specific heritable component. . . .
Swedes seem to be better than most people at obeying moral norms. Only 1.4% think it acceptable to claim sick benefits while healthy! Maybe that’s why they’ve been so successful at creating a welfare state. . . .
Where did Western societies get this desire to treat family and non-family the same way? To some extent, it seems to be a longstanding trait. English historian Alan Macfarlane sees a tendency toward weaker kinship ties that goes back at least to the 13th century. Children had no automatic rights to the family property. Parents could leave their property to whomever they liked and disinherit their children if they so wished (Macfarlane, 2012).
Indeed, Macfarlane argues that “Weber’s de-familization of society” was already well advanced in Anglo-Saxon times (Macfarlane, 1992, pp. 173-174 [PDF]). This picture of relatively weak kinship ties is consistent with the Western European marriage pattern. If we look at European societies west of a line running from Trieste to St. Petersburg, we find that certain cultural traits predominate.