In the new era, the dissemination and in-depth interpretation of Wang Yangming’s School of Mind hold significant practical importance for promoting the creative transformation and innovative development of traditional Chinese culture. Although numerous studies have been conducted on Liangzhi, disagreement persists regarding its conceptualization and structure due to a lack of empirical approaches. Therefore, grounded in the inherent connection between contemporary discourse on “Liangzhi” and its philosophical origins, this study aims to systematically investigate the diachronic evolution of the conception of Liangzhi and its modern transformation mechanisms. It specifically focuses on analyzing the evolutionary trajectory and potential stability between the traditional structure of Liangzhi and its contemporary cognitive structure.

In Study 1, paragraphs related to Liangzhi were systematically screened and extracted from The Complete Works of Wang Yangming, relying mainly on an online database with the printed edition serving as a supplementary source. Following a process of group discussion and expert review, the research team performed a content analysis of 219 selected paragraphs and sentences using a specially developed classification framework. This process led to the identification of two core doctrinal dimensions: Benti (original substance) and Gongfu (cultivation through practice). Benti was further reflected in three facets: action (the moral practice of knowing and doing good), affection (the affective endorsement of loving good and hating evil), and conation (the aspiration to become a sage). Based on these findings, Liangzhi was conceptualized as an innate moral standard inherent in human nature, one that must be consciously cultivated through gongfu to evolve from a latent potential to a fully manifested state.

In Study 2, a lexical approach was employed to construct a lexicon of Liangzhi descriptors. Data were collected through word association and open-ended questionnaires administered to 324 and 293 university students, respectively. From the 5,861 responses, 108 high-frequency terms were identified. An additional 108 students then rated the importance of these terms on a Likert scale. Terms with mean ratings below 3.5 points were excluded, resulting in a final set of 92 items that constitute the Liangzhi Lexical Rating Scale for contemporary university students. An exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was first conducted with a sample of 542 participants. Subsequently, an independent additional sample of 922 participants was newly recruited and randomly split into two subsamples of 461 each. A second EFA was performed on one of these subsamples, which yielded a five-factor structure. The other subsample was used for confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), which confirmed the structure and showed good model fit (χ²/df = 3.18, CFI =.91, TLI =.90, RMSEA =.07, SRMR =.05). The final scale with 24 items demonstrated sound internal consistency and reliability, validating the five dimensions of Liangzhi: knowledge, affection, conation, action, and gongfu.

This study provides the first empirical examination of the abstract structure of Liangzhi. A comparison of the two studies reveals that while contemporary university students’ cognitive construct of Liangzhi closely aligns with the traditional framework in the dimensions of affection, conation, action, and gongfu, notable differences emerge in their concrete manifestations. For instance, historically significant norms such as “loyalty to the ruler” have lost relevance in modern contexts due to conflicts with contemporary values like equality and democracy. More fundamentally, the dimension of knowledge of Liangzhi has undergone a significant conceptual shift, moving from an emphasis on innate intuition toward cognitive reflection and rational discernment in moral judgment. These findings reflect an overarching trend of intellectualization and rationalization of Liangzhi in modern society. Furthermore, the multidimensional structure of Liangzhi helps explain the motivational drivers behind moral failure. That is, why people sometimes fail to do good and avoid evil. Additionally, it offers a holistic framework for interpreting Liangzhi as a psychological construct.