The social cognitive theory of morality attempts to explain how moral thinking, in interaction with other psychosocial determinants, govern individual moral conduct. Social cognitive theory adopts an interactionist perspective to the development of moral behavior. Personal factors of the individual, such as individual moral thought, emotional reactions to behavior, personal moral conduct, and factors within their environment, all interact with, and affect each other. Social cognitive theory contests, in many ways, with the stage theories of moral reasoning.
Social cognitive theory attempts to understand why an individual uses a "lower level" of moral reasoning when they are, theoretically, at a higher level. It also attempts to explain the way social interactions help to form new, as well as change existing, moral standards. In comparison to healthy women, women with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) due to complex childhood trauma were less likely to approve utilitarian actions in dilemmas involving the infliction of direct physical harm.