Moral foundations and attitudes towards supervised consumption services: a regional moderation study.

backgroundResearch shows consistent links between supervised consumption services (SCS) and positive health outcomes for people who use drugs, as well as reductions in the economic burdens associated with illicit substance use. However, SCS often face considerable opposition and resistance from political figures and local community members. This opposition to SCS appears to be driven, in part, by perceived violations of individuals' moral foundations. PURPOSE: We sought to interrogate a recently published and unexpected finding indicating that Manitobans' had the highest levels of support for SCS among the Prairie Provinces, despite being the only Prairie Province without a currently operating SCS. The Prairie Provinces refer to Alberta, Manitoba, and Saskatchewan, and comprise a region of Western Canada characterized by grasslands and lowlands. We hypothesized that differences in the predictive strength of moral foundations on attitudes towards SCS between residents of provinces with (Alberta and Saskatchewan) and without (Manitoba) an operating SCS might help to clarify this phenomenon.

methodWe recruited a sample of 2116 adult participants from the three Prairie Provinces in Canada through online research panels (Manitoba, n = 716; Saskatchewan, n = 700; and Alberta, n = 700). We tested Province × Moral Foundations interactions through a series of moderated multiple logistic regression models.

resultsWe found consistent interaction effects indicating that binding moral foundations (authority, loyalty, purity) were stronger predictors of opposition towards SCS for residents of Manitoba compared to residents of Alberta and Saskatchewan.

conclusionsThese findings help to clarify how Manitobans' slightly lower levels of binding moral foundations may have translated into relatively large differences in support for SCS compared to individuals living in Alberta and Saskatchewan. This study extends past research in being the first, to date, to show that associations between moral foundations and attitudes towards SCS may depend on regional factors such as proximity to an extant SCS. Our results point to the strategic value of framing arguments that appeal to individuals' binding moral foundations for overcoming opposition to SCS, especially the first SCS to be introduced in a province, state, or region.