OCR Psychology For A Level Book 1 sample

Developmental core study 3: Kohlberg on Moral development The detailed version Biographical notes Lawrence Kohlberg ’s (1927–1987) main contribution to psychology was his theory of moral development though he also wrote about gender development. He began his research on moral development as part of his PhD thesis and that work formed the basis of his theory. He was a Professor of Psychology at Harvard University. One of his interests was in finding ways to apply the theory. Kohlberg observed that children raised on Israeli kibbutzim (where the community is more important than the individual members) were morally more advanced than those not raised on kibbutzim. This led him to suggest that belonging to a democratic group and being involved in making moral judgements may aid moral development. Kohlberg set up Cluster Schools (also called ‘just‘ communities) in a number of American schools, and even one in a prison. Members had the power to define and resolve disputes within the group, encouraging moral development. This is a detailed version of the core study. It follows the original article quite closely and therefore it doesn’t fit quite as neatly into the usual categories. The article is more of a review of Kohlberg’s theory and research than a straightforward report of a research study. Moral levels Kohlberg’s theory consists of three levels: I. Preconventional Aged 4–10. Good (i.e. moral) behaviour is determined by avoiding punishment, rewards, exchange of favours. Children of this age sometimes behave quite cruelly (i.e. immoral), as portrayed in the book Lord of the Flies and in the comic Peanuts . II. Conventional Described as ‘conformist’. Children seek to conform to the rules of family, social group or nation, and to help maintain the rules. III. Postconventional Autonomous moral principles. Individual acts according to universal principles that apply apart from the authority of the groups who hold them. Moral stages Each level is divided into two stages: Preconventional Stage 1 Punishment orientation Unquestioning deference to a superior power. The physical consequence of an action determines its goodness or badness. Stage 2 Instrumental orientation ‘You scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours.’ Fairness is important as long as one’s own needs are satisfied. Conventional Stage 3 Good boy /girl orientation Child behaves well to please others. Behaviour judged by intention, ‘He means well’. Stage 4 Authority orientation Respect for authority, fixed rules, doing one’s duty. Seeking to maintain the social order. Postconventional Stage 5 Social contract orientation A ‘legal’ point of view. Respect for democratic process of arriving at social rules, e.g. those who wrote the US Constitution. Stage 6 Universal ethical principles Decisions based on one’s own conscience. Respect for the dignity of all humans. Background and aims Current trends in many different fields of study (ethics, linguistics, anthropology and cognitive psychology ) have suggested a more value-free approach to understanding human behaviour. The focus is on what is common to all societies instead of looking at the differences. For the previous twelve years Lawrence Kohlberg and his colleagues had been following the moral development of 75 boys from early adolescence to young manhood. He additionally studied moral development in other cultures – Great Britain, Canada, Malaysia, Taiwan, Mexico and Turkey. Kohlberg was initially inspired by the work of Jean Piaget who created a general structure to explain moral development in terms of how thinking changes as a child gets older. The important point of Piaget’s structure is that it is theoretical – a person’s moral principles are not tied to any particular moral decisions or actions but are a general set of principles. These principles act as a personal theory or philosophy. The second key point of such a structure is that there are stages in development. At each stage the individual has a separate moral philosophy. These philosophies are quite different from an adult’s way of thinking. Children may seem to agree with adult standards but actually they have different ways of making moral judgements. These different ways do not come in any direct or obvious way from parents, teachers or even other peers. In other words they appear to be universal and innate. background Chapter 4: Developmental psychology 198 A level only