Avoiding Animal Suffering and Preserving Human Lives: Mind Perception and Speciesism in Moral Judgments of Torture and Killing

What is worse-torturing an animal or killing it? What about humans? In three studies (<i>n</i> = 472), torturing animals was perceived as worse than killing, but this was significantly reduced or reversed for humans. This was partially explained by mind-perception (agency or experience), and also by an aversion to the loss of human lives over and above this (speciesism). Study 1 provided evidence that the moral wrongness of torturing a hypothetical animal was worse than killing, but killing was worse for human targets. Study 2 partially replicated and extended these results across different species. Ratings were predicted by mind perception, and speciesist preference to avoid human death. Study 3 used pairs of species, separating torture and killing judgments, showing that while speciesism is important for explaining the greater weight people place on human lives, it played a smaller role in judgments about suffering after accounting for mind-perception.