Understanding the morality of unbelievers: Secular beliefs about right and wrong in ten countries

Many people around the world believe that to be moral, one must believe in God. However, individuals who do not believe in God also hold distinct ethical beliefs. Similar to theists, non-theists in different cultures may share overarching narratives about morality and what it is founded upon – a possibility that remains to be systematically researched. In the present study, we utilised open-ended survey data to explore what non-religious non-theists from ten countries (N = 996) described as the basis of their views on right and wrong. We furthermore investigated how different beliefs about morality clustered together. The findings point towards cross-culturally recurring non-theistic beliefs and belief clusters pertaining to 1) important moral principles and 2) non-theistic ways to view the source of morality. We furthermore discuss country-specific findings, such as the importance of ‘conscience’ for Turkish and Czech participants and ‘cultural Christianity’ in the Danish sample. Altogether, the results support research indicating that a lack of belief in God does not entail moral relativism and question views on non-theists primarily seeing morality as self-constructed. Instead, our findings point towards a more prominent role of social interaction and ‘social contract’ in non-theistic views about right and wrong. We suggest that predominant ways of measurement in moral psychology may currently engulf the diversity of non-theistic moral outlooks and communal moralities in particular. To our knowledge, the study provides the first data-driven examination of non-theists’ views on right and wrong in different cultures.