MORAL DEVELOPMENT

Moral development involves changes in thoughts, feelings, and behaviours regarding

standards of right and wrong. Moral development has an intrapersonal dimension, which
regulates a person’s activities when she or he is not engaged in social interaction, and an
interpersonal dimension, which regulates social interactions and arbitrates conflict.

To understand moral development, we need to consider five basic questions:

1. How do adolescents reason, or think, about rules for ethical conduct?

2. How do adolescents actually behave in moral circumstances?
3. How do adolescents feel about moral matters?
4. What comprises an adolescent’s moral personality?
5. How is the adolescent’s moral domain different from the adolescent’s social
conventional and personal domains?

MORAL THOUGHT

Lawrence Kohlberg crafted a major theory of how adolescents think about right and
wrong. He proposed that moral development is based primarily on moral reasoning and
unfolds in a series of stages.

Kohlberg hypothesized three levels of moral development, each of which is

characterized by two stages. A key concept in understanding progression through the levels
and stages is that people’s morality becomes more internal or mature.

Kohlberg’s Level 1: Preconventional Reasoning

Preconventional reasoning is the lowest level in Kohlberg’s theory of moral

development. Its two stages are punishment and obedience orientation; individualism,
instrumental purpose, and exchange.

• Stage 1: Punishment and obedience orientation - At this stage, moral thinking is

often tied to punishment. For example, children and adolescents obey adults because adults
tell them to obey.

• Stage 2: Individualism, instrumental purpose, and exchange - At this stage,

individuals pursue their own interests but also let others do the same. Thus, what is right
involves an equal exchange. People are nice to others so that others will be nice to them in
return.

Kohlberg’s Level 2: Conventional Reasoning

Conventional reasoning is the second, or intermediate, level in Kohlberg’s theory of

moral development. Individuals abide by certain standards (internal), but they are the
standards of others (external), such as parents or the laws of society. In conventional
reasoning, individuals develop expectations about social roles. The conventional reasoning
level consists of two stages: mutual interpersonal expectations, relationships, and
interpersonal conformity; and social systems morality.

• Stage 3: Mutual interpersonal expectations, relationships, and interpersonal

conformity - At this stage, individuals value trust, caring, and loyalty to others as a basis of
moral judgments. Children and adolescents often adopt their parents’ moral standards at
this stage, seeking to be thought of by their parents as a “good girl” or a “good boy.”

• Stage 4: Social systems morality - At this stage, moral judgments are based on
understanding the social order, law, justice, and duty. For example, adolescents may say
that, for a community to work effectively, it needs to be protected by laws that are adhered
to by its members. Thus, in Stage 4 reasoning, individuals engage in social perspective taking
that goes beyond intimate acquaintances to encompass the importance of being a good
citizen.

Kohlberg’s Level 3: Postconventional Reasoning

Postconventional reasoning is the highest level in Kohlberg’s theory of moral

development. At this level, morality is more internal. The individual recognizes alternative
moral courses, explores the options, and then decides on a moral code. In postconventional
reasoning, individuals engage in deliberate checks on their reasoning to ensure that it meets
high ethical standards. The postconventional level of morality consists of two stages: social
contract or utility and individual rights, and universal ethical principles.

• Stage 5: Social contract or utility and individual rights - At this stage, individuals
reason that values, rights, and principles undergird or transcend the law. A person evaluates
the validity of actual laws and examines social systems in terms of the degree to which they
preserve and protect fundamental human rights and values.

• Stage 6: Universal ethical principles - At this stage, the person has developed a
moral standard based on universal human rights. When faced with a conflict between law
and conscience, the person will follow conscience, even though the decision might involve
personal risk.

Kohlberg argued that these levels and stages occur in a sequence and are age-
related: Before age 9, most children reason about moral dilemmas in a preconventional
way; by early adolescence, they reason in more conventional ways. Most adolescents
reason at stage 3, with some signs of stages 2 and 4. By early adulthood, a small number of
individuals reason in postconventional ways.

MORAL BEHAVIOR

Basic Processes:

Processes of reinforcement, punishment, and imitation can explain how and why
adolescents learn certain moral behaviours and why their behaviours differ from one
another. When adolescents are positively reinforced for behaviour that is consistent with
laws and social conventions, they are likely to repeat that behaviour. When models who
behave morally are provided, adolescents are likely to adopt similar behaviour. And, when
adolescents are punished for immoral or unacceptable behaviour, those behaviours can be
eliminated, but at the expense of sanctioning punishment by its very use and of causing
emotional side effects for the adolescent.

The effectiveness of reinforcement and punishment depends on how consistently

they are administered and the schedule that is adopted. The effectiveness of modelling
depends on the characteristics of the model (power, warmth, uniqueness, and so on) and
the presence of cognitive processes, such as symbolic codes and imagery, to enhance
retention of the modelled behaviour.

Behaviourists emphasize that moral behaviour is situationally dependent, that is,

adolescents are not likely to display consistent moral behaviour in diverse social settings. In
a classic investigation of moral behaviour, Hugh Hartshorne and Mark May (1928–1930)
observed the moral responses of 11,000 children and adolescents who were given the
opportunity to lie, cheat, and steal in a variety of circumstances—at home, at school, at
social events, and in athletics. A completely honest or a completely dishonest child or
adolescent was difficult to find. Situation-specific moral behaviour was the rule.

Social Cognitive Theory of Moral Development:

The social cognitive theory of moral development by Albert Bandura emphasizes a

distinction between adolescents’ moral competence—the ability to produce moral
behaviours—and moral performance—the enactment of those behaviours in specific
situations.

Competence, or acquisition, is primarily the outgrowth of cognitive-sensory

processes. Competencies include what adolescents are capable of doing, what they know,
their skills, their awareness of moral rules and regulations, and their cognitive ability to
construct behaviours. In contrast, adolescents’ moral performance, or behaviour, is
determined by their motivation and the rewards and incentives to act in a specific moral
way.

Albert Bandura also concludes that moral development is best understood by

considering a combination of social and cognitive factors, especially those involving self-
control. He proposes that in developing a “moral self, individuals adopt standards of right
and wrong that serve as guides and deterrents for conduct. In this self-regulatory process,
people monitor their conduct and the conditions under which it occurs, judge it in relation
to moral standards, and regulate their actions by the consequences they apply to
themselves. They do things that provide them with satisfaction and a sense of self-worth.
They refrain from behaving in ways that violate their moral standards because such conduct
will bring self-condemnation. Self-sanctions keep conduct in line with internal standards”
(Bandura, 2002). Thus, in Bandura’s view, self-regulation rather than abstract reasoning is
the key to positive moral development.

Moral behaviour includes both negative aspects of behaviour—cheating, lying, and

stealing, for example—and positive aspects of behaviour—such as being considerate to
others and giving to a worthy cause.
Prosocial Behavior:

Many prosocial acts involve altruism, an unselfish interest in helping another person.
Altruism is found throughout the human world and is a guiding principle in Christianity,
Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, and Judaism. Although adolescents have often been described
as egocentric and selfish, adolescent acts of altruism are, nevertheless, plentiful.

The circumstances most likely to involve altruism by adolescents are empathetic or

sympathetic emotion for an individual in need or a close relationship between the
benefactor and the recipient. Prosocial behaviour occurs more often in adolescence than in
childhood, although examples of caring for others and comforting someone in distress occur
even during the preschool years. Cognitive changes involving advances in abstract, idealistic,
and logical reasoning as well as increased empathy and emotional understanding likely are
involved. With such newfound cognitive abilities, young adolescents increasingly sympathize
with members of abstract groups with whom they have little experience, such as people
living in poverty in other countries. Adolescent females view themselves as more prosocial
and empathic, and also engage in more prosocial behaviour than do males. For example, a
review of research found that across childhood and adolescence, females engaged in more
prosocial behaviour (Eisenberg & Fabes, 1998). The biggest gender difference occurred for
kind and considerate behaviour, with a smaller difference in sharing.

Types of prosocial behavior

According to Gustavo Carlo and his colleagues, six types of prosocial behaviour are
present in young adolescents:

• altruism (“One of the best things about doing charity work is that it looks good.”)

• public (“Helping others while I’m being watched is when I work best.”)

• emotional (“I usually help others when they are very upset.”)

• dire (“I tend to help people who are hurt badly.”)

• anonymous (“I prefer to donate money without anyone knowing.”)

• compliant (“I never wait to help others when they ask for it.”)
 Forgiveness is an aspect of prosocial behaviour that occurs when the injured person
releases the injurer from possible behavioural retaliation. One study revealed that when
adolescents encountered hurtful experiences in school settings, if they disliked the
transgressor, they had more hostile thoughts, feelings of anger, and avoidance/revenge
tendencies than they did when they liked the transgressing peer.

Gratitude is a feeling of thankfulness and appreciation, especially in response to

someone doing something kind or helpful. Gratitude was linked to a number of positive
aspects of development in young adolescents, including satisfaction with one’s family,
optimism, and prosocial behaviour (Froh, Yurkewicz, & Kashdan, 2009).

MORAL FEELING

Among the ideas formulated about the development of moral feeling are concepts
central to psychoanalytic theory, the nature of empathy, and the role of emotions in moral
development.

Psychoanalytic Theory

In Freud’s classical psychoanalytic theory, an individual’s superego—the moral

branch of personality—develops in early childhood when the child resolves the Oedipus
conflict and identifies with the same-sex parent. According to Freud, one reason why
children resolve the Oedipus conflict is to alleviate the fear of losing their parents’ love and
of being punished for their unacceptable sexual wishes toward the opposite-sex parent. To
reduce anxiety, avoid punishment, and maintain parental affection, children form a
superego by identifying with the same-sex parent. In Freud’s view, through this
identification, children internalize the parents’ standards of right and wrong that reflect
societal prohibitions. At the same time, children turn inward the hostility that was
previously aimed at the same-sex parent. This inwardly directed hostility is then
experienced self-punitively (and unconsciously) as guilt. In the psychoanalytic account of
moral development, children and adolescents conform to societal standards to avoid guilt.

In Freud’s view, the superego consists of two main components—the ego ideal and
the conscience—which promote children’s and adolescents’ development of moral feelings.
The ego ideal is the component of the superego that involves ideal standards approved by
parents, whereas the conscience is the component of the superego that involves behaviours
not approved of by parents. An individual’s ego ideal rewards the individual by conveying a
sense of pride and personal value when the individual acts according to moral standards.
The conscience punishes the individual for acting immorally by making the individual feel
guilty and worthless. In this way, self-control replaces parental control.

Erik Erikson outlined three stages of moral development: specific moral learning in
childhood, ideological concerns in adolescence, and ethical consolidation in adulthood.

Empathy

Positive feelings, such as empathy, contribute to adolescents’ moral development.

Feeling empathy means reacting to another’s feelings with an emotional response that is
similar to that person’s feelings. Although empathy is experienced as an emotional state, it
often has a cognitive component—the ability to discern another’s inner psychological states
(perspective taking). At about 10 to 12 years of age, individuals develop empathy for people
who live in unfortunate circumstances (Damon, 1988). Children’s concerns are no longer
limited to the feelings of specific persons in situations they directly observe. Instead, 10- to
12-year-olds expand their concerns to the general problems of people in unfortunate
circumstances—the poor, those with disabilities, social outcasts, and so forth. This
newfound sensitivity may lead older children to behave altruistically, and later may give a
humanitarian flavour to adolescents’ development of ideological and political views.
Although every adolescent may be capable of responding with empathy, not all do so.
Adolescents’ empathic behaviour varies considerably. For example, in older children and
adolescents, empathic dysfunctions can contribute to antisocial behaviour. Some
delinquents convicted of violent crimes show a lack of feeling for their victims’ distress.

The Contemporary Perspective

Both positive feelings, such as empathy, sympathy, admiration, and self-esteem, and
negative feelings, such as anger, outrage, shame, and guilt, contribute to adolescents’ moral
development. When strongly experienced, these emotions influence adolescents to act in
accord with standards of right and wrong. Such emotions as empathy, shame, guilt, and
anxiety over other people’s violations of standards are present early in development and
undergo developmental change throughout childhood and adolescence.
 MORAL PERSONALITY

Three important aspects of moral personality are

(1) moral identity,

(2) moral character, and

(3) moral exemplars.

Moral Identity:

Individuals have a moral identity when moral notions and commitments are central
to their life. In this view, behaving in a manner that violates this moral commitment places
the integrity of the self at risk. Mature moral individuals engage in moral metacognition,
including moral self-monitoring and moral self-reflection.

Moral self-monitoring involves monitoring one’s thoughts and actions related to

moral situations, and engaging in self-control when it is needed. Moral self-reflection
encompasses critical evaluations of one’s self-judgments and eff orts to minimize bias and
self-deception.

Moral Character

According to James Rest, moral character involves having the strength of your
convictions, persisting, and overcoming distractions and obstacles. If individuals don’t have
moral character, they may wilt under pressure or fatigue, fail to follow through, or become
distracted and discouraged and fail to behave morally. Moral character presupposes that
the person has set moral goals and that achieving those goals involves the commitment to
act in accord with those goals. In Rest’s view, moral motivation involves prioritizing moral
values over other personal values.

Moral Exemplars

Moral exemplars are people who have lived exemplary lives. Moral exemplars, have
a moral personality, identity, character, and set of virtues that reflect moral excellence and
commitment. In one study, three different exemplars of morality were examined—brave,
caring, and just (Walker & Hennig, 2004). Different personality profiles emerged for the
three exemplars. The brave exemplar was characterized by being dominant and extraverted,
the caring exemplar by being nurturant and agreeable, and the just exemplar by being
conscientious and open to experience.

Contexts of Moral Development

Adolescents’ experiences in families and schools also are important contexts for
moral development.

Parenting

In Freud’s psychoanalytic theory, the aspects of child rearing that encourage moral
development are practices that instill the fears of punishment and of losing parental love.
Developmentalists who have studied child-rearing techniques and moral development have
focused on parents’ discipline techniques. These include love withdrawal, power assertion,
and induction (Hoff man, 1970):

• Love withdrawal comes closest to the psychoanalytic emphasis on fear of

punishment and of losing parental love. It is a discipline technique in which a parent
withholds attention or love from the adolescent, as when the parent refuses to talk to the
adolescent or states a dislike for the adolescent.

• Power assertion is a discipline technique in which a parent attempts to gain

control over the adolescent or the adolescent’s resources. Examples include spanking,
threatening, or removing privileges.

• Induction is the discipline technique in which a parent uses reason and explanation
of the consequences for others of the adolescent’s actions. Examples of induction include,
“Don’t hit him. He was only trying to help” and “Why are you yelling at her? She didn’t mean
to hurt your feelings.”

Research on parental discipline techniques had found that induction is more

positively related to moral development than is love withdrawal or power assertion.

Schools
 Schools are an important context for moral development.

The Hidden Curriculum: Educator John Dewey (1933) recognized that even when schools do
not have specific programs in moral education, they provide moral education through a
“hidden curriculum.” The hidden curriculum is conveyed by the moral atmosphere that is a
part of every school. The moral atmosphere is created by school and classroom rules, the
moral orientation of teachers and school administrators, and text materials. Teachers serve
as models of ethical or unethical behaviour. Classroom rules and peer relations at school
transmit attitudes about cheating, lying, stealing, and consideration for others. And, by
enforcing rules and regulations, the school administration infuses the school with a value
system.

Character Education: Character education is a direct education approach that involves

teaching students a basic moral literacy to prevent them from engaging in immoral
behaviour and doing harm to themselves or others. Every school should have an explicit
moral code that is clearly communicated to students. According to traditional views of
character education, any violations of the code should be met with sanctions; however,
recent approaches advocate a more democratic solution. Instruction in specified moral
concepts, such as cheating, can take the form of example and definition, class discussions
and role playing, or rewarding students for proper behaviour.

Encouraging students to develop a care perspective has been accepted as a relevant

aspect of character education. Rather than just instructing adolescents to refrain from
morally deviant behaviour, advocates of a care perspective encourage students to engage in
prosocial behaviours such as considering others’ feelings, being sensitive to others, and
helping others.

Values Clarification: A second approach to providing moral education is values clarification,

which involves helping individuals to clarify what their lives are for and what is worth
working for. Unlike character education, which tells students what their values should be,
values clarification encourages students to define their own values and to understand the
values of others.

Cognitive Moral Education: A third approach to moral education, cognitive moral education,
is based on the belief that students should learn to value such things as democracy and
justice as their moral reasoning develops. In a typical program, high school students meet in
a semester-long course to discuss a number of moral issues. The instructor acts as a
facilitator rather than as a director of the class. The hope is that students will develop more
advanced notions of such concepts as cooperation, trust, responsibility, and community.

Service Learning: A form of education in which students provide service to the community.
In service learning, adolescents engage in activities such as tutoring, helping older adults,
working in a hospital, assisting at a child-care centre, or cleaning up a vacant lot to make a
play area. An important goal of service learning is that adolescents become less self-centred
and more strongly motivated to help others.

Service learning is often more effective when two conditions are met (Nucci, 2006):

(1) students are given some degree of choice in the service activities in which they
participate, and

(2) students are provided opportunities to reflect about their participation.

Cheating: A moral education concern is whether students cheat and how to handle the
cheating if it is detected. Academic cheating can take many forms including plagiarism, using
“cheat sheets” during an exam, copying from a neighbour during a test, purchasing papers,
and falsifying lab results. Among the reasons students give for cheating include pressure to
get high grades, time constraints, poor teaching, and lack of interest.

A long history of research also implicates the power of the situation in determining
whether students cheat or not. For example, students are more likely to cheat when they
are not being closely monitored during a test; when they know their peers are cheating;
when they know whether or not another student has been caught cheating; and when
student scores are made public. Research revealed that college students who engaged in
academic cheating were characterized by the personality traits of low conscientiousness and
low agreeableness.

Among the strategies for decreasing academic cheating are preventive measures
such as making sure students are aware of what constitutes cheating, making clear the
consequences if they do cheat, closely monitoring students’ behaviour while they are taking
tests, and emphasizing the importance of being a moral, responsible individual who engages
in academic integrity.

An Integrative Approach: Darcia Narváez emphasized an integrative approach to moral

education that encompasses both the reflective moral thinking and commitment to justice
advocated in Kohlberg’s approach, and the development of a particular moral character
advocated in the character education approach.

VALUES

Values are beliefs and attitudes about the way things should be. They involve what is
important to us. We attach values to all sorts of things: politics, religion, money, sex,
education, helping others, family, friends, career, cheating, self-respect, and so on.