Relational Moral Reasoning: A Tripartite Framework Expanding Anthropocentrism and Biocentrism

Abstract

In the context of global ecological crises, relational moral reasoning offers an important lens for understanding pathways toward a sustainable future. Historically, environmental moral psychology has relied on a binary distinction between anthropocentric (human-centered) and biocentric (nature-centered) reasoning. We propose a tripartite framework that centers relational moral concerns for reciprocity, harmony, kinship, and interdependence, advancing (1) relationships among people embedded in nature (living in), (2) relationships between people and the natural world (living with), and (3) relationships grounded in relational embeddedness (living as). Each orientation can be expressed through corporeal (physical, functional), metacorporeal (socio-emotional, cultural, spiritual), and ecorelational-justice (rights, fairness, responsibility) forms. Relational moral reasoning is a qualitatively distinct mode of moral concern. We position relationship-centered moral reasoning alongside the established framework, expanding the analytic and theoretical explanatory scope of environmental moral psychology. Drawing on over two decades of empirical research with children and adults across cultural contexts, we offer a proof-of-concept illustration of how relational concerns emerge in moral thought. Relational moral reasoning is developmentally present, psychologically rich, and culturally diverse, and it warrants explicit analytic attention. Centering relational moral concerns in psychological research contributes to the growing “relational turn” in sustainability and psychological sciences by clarifying how relationships themselves garner moral attention, with implications for research, education, policy, and practice. As a conceptual and generative contribution, this paper expands the tools available for studying environmental moral reasoning by making relational moral concerns more visible and empirically tractable.