Tomasello's target article describes how the sense of moral obligation emerges from a shared perspective with collaborative partners and in-group members. Once adopted, this shared perspective motivates compliance with the normative expectations of one's group, thereby facilitating social coordination and behavioral regulation. Although we agree that adopting shared perspectives with significant others plays a central role in human motivation and cognition (Shteynberg Reference Shteynberg2015; Reference Shteynberg2018), there is a critical aspect of human morality that is not discussed in the target article: the conflict of obligations. We argue that facing obligational conflicts is a key process by which humans become moral agents, pursuing a moral code that transcends the demands of any particular social role.

Tomasello's article focuses on relatively simple situations in which a single group perspective (or “we”) serves to regulate one's actions. In these contexts, there is a relatively straightforward motivation to comply with the normative expectations of one's group. Violating these norms can threaten one's group membership, while conforming to them helps to preserve relational ties (Cialdini & Goldstein Reference Cialdini and Goldstein2004). As identification with the group increases, so too is there a stronger motivational force driving the desire for normative compliance (Terry et al. Reference Terry, Hogg and White1999). In single-group contexts, human morality can thus be evaluated with a single question: Is an individual conforming to or deviating from the group norms?

Although social psychologists have traditionally studied identity dynamics in the context of a single social group, there is a growing recognition that each person can belong to many partially overlapping groups at the same time (Bodenhausen Reference Bodenhausen2010; Kang & Bodenhausen Reference Kang and Bodenhausen2015; Roccas & Brewer Reference Roccas and Brewer2002). Critically, each one of these group-bounded identities carries with it a unique set of normative expectations for guiding behavior. While these norms are occasionally in alignment with one another, they are also prone to conflict. A lawyer may, for example, be expected to act in a highly assertive and competitive manner at work based on the norms of her office. When interacting with her family, however, she may feel obliged to adopt a softer and more nurturing persona in accordance with traditional gender norms. If these incompatible normative standards become activated at the same time (e.g., at the office holiday party), the result is an aversive state of behavioral conflict and uncertainty (Hirsh & Kang Reference Hirsh and Kang2016). In these cases, the obligations that derive from one's various group-based identities cannot all be enacted at once, as satisfying a moral duty in one domain can undermine it in another.

Recognizing the complexity of human identity and social life thus provides an important extension of Tomasello's framework for the moral psychology of obligation. In particular, a given individual will have not only one, but many distinct shared perspectives that can be brought to bear on a given situation. The result is a constant flux of felt obligations that wax and wane with the salience of one's various group identities. In light of this normative diversity, human morality goes beyond the simple question of whether or not to comply with the felt obligations of one's group, expanding to include the more complex question of which obligations to prioritize in a given situation. Although the easiest solution is often to ignore any moral obligations that are not directly relevant to the current social context (Lerner & Tetlock Reference Lerner and Tetlock1999), we are nonetheless often forced to reconcile incompatible social demands. Indeed, the moral uncertainty that accompanies ethical dilemmas, wherein two or more ethical norms are in apparent conflict, has been argued to play a key role in the engagement of moral reasoning processes (Hirsh et al. Reference Hirsh, Lu and Galinsky2018; Rest Reference Rest1986). Navigating the tensions between diverse group obligations is thus a central aspect of human social life and a core component of moral agency and personal identity (Shteynberg Reference Shteynberg2012).

Different social environments also vary substantially in the extent to which a group's normative expectations are clearly defined and enforced (Gelfand et al. Reference Gelfand, Harrington and Jackson2017). Cultural contexts that have been subject to a broader range of ecological and historical threats tend to adopt stricter normative standards for governing behavior, with stronger sanctions for those who deviate from social expectations (Gelfand et al. Reference Gelfand, Raver, Nishii, Leslie, Lun, Lim, Duan, Almaliach, Ang, Arnadottir, Aycan, Boehnke, Boski, Cabecinas, Chan, Chhokar, D'Amato, Ferrer, Fischlmayr, Fischer, Fulup, Georgas, Kashima, Kashima, Kim, Lempereur, Marquez, Othman, Overlaet, Panagiotopoulou, Peltzer, Perez-Florizno, Ponomarenko, Realo, Schei, Schmitt, Smith, Soomro, Szabo, Taveesin, Toyama, Van de Vliert, Vohra, Ward and Yamaguchi2011). The result is a “tight” culture, wherein individual freedom is sacrificed for the sake of well-regulated group coordination. In contrast, cultural contexts that have faced fewer threats tend to be more permissive or “loose”, allowing a broader range of socially acceptable behavioral options at the expense of having less-predictable social encounters. Given that tight cultures tend to be more socially cohesive, people within them are likely to experience the feeling of personal obligation to normative standards in a relatively unambiguous manner, as described by Tomasello. Cultural environments with looser norms and more flexible identity structures, however, are more likely to afford conflicting perspectives and inconsistent normative standards. Moral agency in such contexts is even more clearly rooted in an individual's attempts to harmonize competing expectations (e.g., through moral reasoning).

In summary, modern human life is far more complex than the single-group contexts that defined our early human ancestors. Advances in globalization, communication technology, and economic development have all contributed to a social landscape that features a diverse multiplicity of group-based perspectives and normative expectations. In attempting to live up to one's duty, a central challenge faced by any moral agent is to reconcile the conflicting obligations that derive from adopting multiple roles and identities. Attempts to integrate these conflicting demands are fundamental to the emergence of personal moral agency, and hence should not be overlooked in any account of human morality. Accordingly, a key frontier of future research is to understand the strategies that individuals use to negotiate these conflicting obligations; how the strategies vary across individuals, situations, and cultures; and the consequences they have for social coordination across multiple actors. Situating Tomasello's framework within a broader social-ecological context thus allows a more detailed description of moral obligation in human life.