Moral, concern of right or wrong behavior and the goodness or badness of human character. Impulse, a sudden strong unreflective urge or desire to act. To the bare eye, the reading of both definitions, understandably, would cause one to question the correlation and relativity of both seemingly completely opposite reasonings within the human brain. Although very different in terms of definition, impulses and morals play as equal functioning factors in a person’s psychology regarding decision making, longevity, and set societal standards.

Morals are drilled into our heads from a young age, let the elderly take your seat on the bus, say please and thank you, always respect adults which allows our conscious minds to take the wheel as we progress (Pinker). Our minds create these illusions that if we were to follow a strict guideline of morals our impulsivity would be more out of pure goodness, instead of reactive reflexes (Frijda, Ridderinkhof, Rietveld). Presumably, our minds create these guidelines based on stories we are told of the more saintly versus the complete opposite of a saint (Pinker).

Most times, morality is like a light switch in the responsive parts of our human psychology. We see something that does not necessarily appeal to our ever developing moral foundations, and the flip we subconsciously have made through our progression of being told what is good and what is not, is ultimately flipped to ‘on’ creating invocation and a more impulsive reflex towards said situation (Pinker). While possibly a more morally appeasing situation is to occur in front of our conscious brain, we, as humans, are more likely to have our impulse control switched to ‘off’ (Pinker). This allows for a more regulated and thought out response in our psychology (Powell).

Morality is a relatively new study of the five W’s (who, what, when, where and why) which questions the control responses our minds have that make us decide, either consciously or subconsciously, between right and wrong (Powell). Universal truths such as: do not cheat and do not steal, are more widely recognized in our subconscious, but if one person was to break a universal moral, most others would call for punishment against said person, which puts into question more subjective morals. Law, or punishment, do not always follow in direct suit to morals (Powell). For example, if a woman was to jay-walk in front of a cop and was tried in front of jurists who viewed jay-walking as a punishable crime and took into account the fact the woman “might have seen the cop”and take it as disrespect towards authority, more than likely the woman would be charged based strictly off of those jurists views on morals. On the other hand,if that same woman was tried in front of jurists who did not see how jaywalking is a severe enough crime for punishment and the jurists took the woman as just a person trying to get somewhere, more than likely the punishment would become null and void. The moralization perceived through the eyes of the law is not necessarily predetermined by universal truths, but more of objective morals (Powell). If the said woman was to somehow anger the jurists or the judge present, this is where human impulsivity takes control possibly creating a harsher judgement. Morals are usually thrown out of the window when emotions such as anger are present (Frijda, Ridderinkhof, Rietveld).

Impulsivity is reaction to an event that had prior effects on a singular person. Impulse decisions are made after a situation is set into place, instead of acting before a situation is brought into place, the reaction is an after occurance (Frijda, Ridderinkhof, Rietveld). Subsequently, most times reactions of the extreme measure (murder, stealing, rape, etc.) only occur when presented with an inside force, i.e. one’s own psychology. This includes, but not limited to, feelings of extreme desire, anger or sadness (Powell). If one person was to be provoked by a bully of some sort, an absurd amount of anger would slowly swell inside of that said person’s psychology. If said person was to, years later, witness someone being bullied, that person is more likely to react with intense emotion. Impulse control is, essentially, put on hold when faced with past issues or memories (Pinker). The bully on the other hand, thought of as morally blind, or lacking morals. Not necessarily will this said bully never have a set standard of morals, but in the time frame, the bully does not have a sense of rightness or wrongness.

Scientists are slowly coming to a determination that our bodies are built with a set pretense of morals and impulsivity (Frijda, Ridderinkhof, Rietveld).The idea was formed around long lost twins having an uncanny same sense of “agreeableness” and “consciousness” when reunited. This in turn, basically meant that the twins, even though raised in separate households, with different values, still had the same internal belief system. Most philosophers seem to repent against such beliefs, as it is more of a scientific study regarding human genes, then a questionable sense of moral beliefs (Frijda, Ridderinkhof, Rietveld).

The all around part of the brain that is affected and bring upon impulsive actions are frontostriatal circuits in the brain. This is the part of the brain that can either hold back and simmer down the ability to act impulsively or, when triggered, cause the action of impulsivity (Frijda, Ridderinkhof, Rietveld). The cerebellum in the brain receives the information from sensory overload, either through remembrance in visualizing something, smelling something, hearing something, certain touches or feels of things or taste something that sparks a memory. The change in action readiness that is called incipient capture.

All in all, the mental capacity of our human psychology is incomprehendable within the walls and definitions of both moral beliefs and impulsivity. Most have a sepereation of both moral systems within the cerebrum brought about by learning through the five snse and impulsivity of remembarance of certain events. Both  impulses and morals play as equal functioning factors in a person’s psychology regarding decision making, longevity, and set societal standards.