Development of a belief in naïve concepts of free will scale

Abstract

Past research using free description questions suggested that free will generally means the ability for people to choose their actions based on their mental state while being free from constraints. However, existing scales for assessing people’s beliefs regarding free will were developed based on researchers’ theoretical concepts of free will, rather than on people’s naïve concepts of free will. The authors therefore developed a new scale to measure people’s belief in naïve concepts of free will, which consisted of alternative possibilities, agency, and being free from constraints. Three studies with a total of about 4,000 participants (undergraduates and adults) were included in the analysis. The results confirmed the predicted factor structure and reliability of the scale. In addition, the scores for alternative possibilities and agency were positively correlated with the attribution of moral responsibility. These findings are discussed in relation to the psychological and philosophical literature.