“It’s your birthday. Someone gives you a calfskin wallet. How do you react?”

May 7, 2012 5:46 AM

I’m looking for collections of realistic hypothetical scenarios intended to provoke a response or reflection.

Situational judgment tests are kind of what I’m looking for, but they tend toward business & professional contexts, and I’m looking for more general ethical/political/social hypotheticals.

Another example would be Gregory Stock’s The Book of Questions, though it’s not a great match either as the questions aren’t all concrete, real-world hypotheticals but instead include more abstract and even fantastical questions (e.g. If you could kill a person by thinking about his/her death, would you?).

My interest is in the hypothetical scenarios themselves, not how potential responses might be assessed. Both real and fictional examples will work, so long as the hypotheticals posed are realistic. Most useful would be full-text sources freely available online, but recommendations for other publications are welcome.

posted by audi alteram partem to Grab Bag (2 answers total)

I think these are also referred to as morality tests? Here's an example, there are plenty of results on google on that search, too
posted by MangyCarface at 6:31 AM on May 7, 2012

Seconding 'A Book of Questions', loved that book to death. It inspired me to create a similar website a few years back (that Ive neglected since), but came up with scenarios and questions as such. (I need to clean it up)

http://nosimplechoice.com/
posted by edman at 8:59 AM on May 7, 2012