Moral development

Reasoning and Problem-solving
Reasoning – capacity for cognitively combining or reorganizing information to produce additional information: a conclusion or solution.
Problem-solving – when reasoning is used to reach a particular desired output.

Can children reason?

Moral Reasoning
The way a child reasons about right and wrong, his awareness of ethical behavior.
Cognitive processes by which individually make decisions about moral issues and justify these decisions

Kohlberg’s theory
of Moral Development
Level I Preconventional
Morality
(children under 10)
Stage 1. Children are afraid of punishment and obey the rules.
Stage 2. Children want rewards and conform to rules.

Level II Conventional Morality
(from 10 to app 16)
Stage 3. Children want approval from other people.
Stage 4. Adolescence conform to authorities to avoid the feeling of guilt.

Level III Postconventional Morality
(the highest level of moral thinking based on personal standards and beliefs)
Stage 5 – concerned with individual rights and democratic laws
Stage 6 – entirely guided by his own conscience
According to Kohlberg, many people never reach Level III in their moral development.

Moral judgment development research study .
(Nancy Eisenberg, 1987)
What? – one person’s wants conflicted with another’s wants
Who? – groups of children
How long? – 7 years
Conclusion:
1) agreed that moral reasoning became more sophisticated with age.
2) Adolescent girls were more sympathetic and other –oriented than boys in their moral reasoning.
3) Empathy tended to lead to sharing behavior in older children.
The research extends Kohlberg’s emphasis on cognition by demonstrating the importance of emotion in moral reasoning and social behavior.

The connection of Kohlberg’s
theory of moral development
and Piaget’s theory of cognitive development.
1. Only those who’ve achieved formal operational thought (4 stage( are capable of the kind of abstract thinking necessary for Level III, Postconventional morality.
2. Stage 6 requires formulating abstract ethical principles and needs higher cognitive processes: hypothetical relationships, problem solving and making decisions.

Kohlberg’s reports:
Fewer than 10% of his adult subjects show. ‘clear – principled’ stage 6 thinking.
(example: druggist, husband, duty to save from dying. The law of society? Or the law of nature or God?)
Criticism: male centered – because it places a masculine style of abstract reasoning based on justice and rights.
While famine style – based on care and concern for others.