The original poster is correct it's easy to steal in a video game because there is no human emotion in it. Then again, I am playing a video game to get away from real life. I do things I can never do in real life. So I would steal and kill since that is something I would never do in real life.

So yeah, I will steal since there is no consequences in the video game. By that I mean if we steal someone money they will not starve to death since they can't buy food so no human emotion attachment.

I never steal in any of the games I play. Two main reasons. 1) The moral component, which is honestly probably the bigger reason of the two. 2) You don't need to steal. At all. Especially in a Bethesda game and especially since they changed the way the game works. Back in Morrowind I tried to kill Dagoth Fyr so I could "steal" his Daedric Armor, since it was one of only two sets in the entire game (the other being piecemeal all over the world). Since they've moved to a randomized loot based system, all you have to do is keep playing and you will start to see rewards commensurate with the challenges you are performing. I hope they changed that up a little with FO4. Anyway, point is, generally everything you can steal early on isn't worth the risk of trying to nab it AND since the law system in their games causes you to lose what you've stolen after being arrested (I think you just get killed in Fallout though) it again doesn't seem worth the effort. I'd rather just earn my stuff.

Guilty as charged. If its well defined characters then yeah I get attached to them and have in the past stopped myself from doing something because my companion seemed to frown at me doing it.

On the other hand if my companion was closer to Hannibal Lector than Mother Theresa I had no trouble whacking an old lady in the head to see what she had in her purse.

I have compassion, but the temptation to steal everything I can is too strong.