Developmental psychology questions Is there a predictable pattern

Developmental psychology questions… • Is there a predictable pattern individuals follow regarding thought and language and social development? • Do children go through gradual changes or are they abrupt changes?

The Developmental Area 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. Lifespan Typical development Moral development Emotional development Predetermined stages Maturation Systematic changes Cradle to grave

Classsical study: Kohlberg (1968) Stages of Moral Development Area: Developmental Area Theme: Moral Development

Kohlberg 1968 • What is moral development? • The process through which children develop proper attitudes and behaviours toward other people in society, based on social and cultural norms, rules, and laws.

• Background: • Kohlberg was inspired by Piaget’s pioneering effort to apply a structural approach to cognitive development rather than linking it to personality traits. • The typology contains three distinct levels of moral thinking, and within each of these levels distinguishes two related stages Kohlberg’s theory of moral development. Everyone progresses through the levels and stages in order.

• Aim: • The aim of the study was to see if there was evidence to support his theory of moral development.

• Method: • Longitudinal study which followed the development of the same group of boys for twelve years (sample 1) • The aim was to show how, as young adolescents develop into manhood, they move through the distinct levels and stages of moral development (as proposed by Kohlberg in his theory of moral development) • The study also was conducted across cultures using hypothetical moral dilemmas (sample 2)

• Sample: • Sample 1: 75 American boys who were aged 10 -16 at the start of the study. These ppts were followed at three-year intervals through to 22 -28. • Sample 2: Boys from Great Britain, Canada, Taiwan, Mexico and Turkey

• All participants were presented with hypothetical moral dilemmas in the form of short stories to solve. The stories were to determine each participants stage of moral reasoning. The aspects assessed included: obey the rule or act morally • The value of human life was tested by asking participants questions like “Should a doctor ‘mercy kill’ a fatally ill woman requesting death because of her pain? ”. • Another way Kolhberg assessed morality was through the Heinz dilemma.

• The Heinz dilemma: (for sample 1 only) • “Heinz’s wife is dying of cancer. Doctors said a new drug may save her life. The drug had been discovered by a local chemist and Heinz tried to buy some, but the chemist was charging ten times the money it cost to make the drug and Heinz could only raise half of the money. He explained to the chemist that his wife was dying and asked if he could have the drug cheaper or pay the rest of the money later. The chemist refused, saying that he had discovered the drug and was going to make money from it. The husband was desperate to save his wife, so later that night, he broke into the chemist’s and stole the drug. ” •

• The boys would then be asked: • Should he have broken into the lab? Why? • Should the chemist insist on the inflated prices for his invention? Does he have the right? • What should happen to Heinz? • What if Heinz did not love his wife does that make anything different? • What if the dying person was a stranger? • Should the police arrest the chemist for murder if the woman died?

Participants from sample 2 were told a story involving theft of food: “A man’s wife is starving to death but the store owner won’t give the man any food unless he can pay, which he can’t. Should he break in and steal some food? Why? ”

• SAMPLE 1: • Kohlberg found that his staged (outlined in the above table) were reflected in the answers children gave to each scenario (see below) • Kohlberg’s analysis found that 50% of each of the six stages, a participants thinking was at a single stage, regardless of the moral dilemma involved. • In addition, participants showed progress through the stages with increasing age. • In relation to the scenario ‘Should a doctor ‘mercy kill’ a fatally ill woman requesting death because of her pain’, Kolhberg presented the reasoning behind the children’s decision making process.

• SAMPLE 2: (Cross cultural findings) • Taiwanese boys aged 10 -13 tended to give ‘classic’ Stage-2 responses. • Mexico and Taiwan showed the same results except that development was a little slower. • At the age of 16, Stage-5 thinking was much more noticeable in the US than either Mexico or Taiwan. • In these three divergent cultures, middle-class children were found to be more advanced in moral judgement than matched lower-class children. • No important differences were found in the development of moral thinking among Catholics, Protestants, Jews, Buddhists, or atheists.

Conclusions: • There is a developmental sequence in an individual’s moral development. • Each stage of moral development comes one at a time and always in the same order. • An individual may stop at any given stage and at any age. • Moral development fits with Kohlberg’s stage-pattern theory. • There is a cultural universality of sequence of stages. • Middle-class and working-class children move through the same sequence but middle-class children move faster and further. • This 6 -Stage theory of moral development is not significantly affected by widely ranging social, cultural or religious conditions. The only thing that is affected is the rate at which individuals progress through the sequence