Inconclusive prospective effects between parental warmth and children’s moral self: A comment on Wilke and Baker (2025)

A recent study reported reciprocal reinforcing cross-lagged effects between parental warmth and children’s moral self. However, it is well established that cross-lagged effects may be spurious. Here, we used multiverse methodology and reanalyzed data simulated to resemble data used in the challenged study. We found discrepant reinforcing, degrading, and null prospective effects depending on the analyzed model and a meta-analytic aggregation of these discrepant effects did not differ significantly from zero. Moreover, a good fit of the spurious prospective associations model (SPAM) indicated that data may have been generated without any direct effects between parental warmth and children’s moral self. Hence, conclusions of reinforcing prospective effects between parental warmth and children’s moral self appear premature. Researchers analyzing cross-lagged effects are recommended to scrutinize findings by fitting alternative models to their data and to juxtapose findings.