Chapter 7

Sternberg steps in ethical reasoning

1. recognize that there is an event to which to react;

I saw my roommate cheat on an internet-based test.

2. define the event as having an ethical dimension;

It is wrong to cheat and it is a violation of my university’s

honor code not to report it.

3. decide that the ethical dimension is of sufficient

significance to merit an ethics-guided response;

The honor code says that someone who does not

report cheating is equally guilty to someone who

cheats.

4. take personal responsibility for generating an

ethical solution to the problem;

That would be me: I would have failed to report the

cheating

5. figure out what abstract ethical rule(s) might apply to

the problem;

The rule is clear: “Cheating and tolerance of cheating are

not permitted….Violations of the honor code will be subject

to judicial review with penalties ranging up to expulsion.”

6. decide how these abstract ethical rules actually apply to

the problem so as to suggest a concrete solution;

I am required to report the violation to the Dean of Student

Affairs.

7. prepare for later possible repercussions of having acted in what one considers an ethical manner;

If I report my roommate, I will lose his friendship and will antagonize

his friends and some of mine. If I do not report my roommate, I will

have committed an ethical offense and also will be subject to

discipline.

8. enact the ethical solution.

I have to report my roommate and bear the consequences. I have

no realistic other option.

kholbergs cognitive dev theory

Central to Kohlberg’s work on moral development:

Interviews with individuals of different ages

In the interviews, individuals presented with a series of

stories in which characters face moral dilemmas

After reading the story, interviewers asked a series of

questions about each moral dilemma

From the answers interviewees gave, Kohlberg

hypothesized three levels of moral development:

• Preconventional reasoning

• Conventional reasoning

• Postconventional reasoning

A key concept in understanding progression through

these levels: morality becomes more internal or

mature

• Individuals’ reasons for their moral decisions or values begin

to go beyond the external or superficial reasons they gave

when they were younger

kholbergs 3 levels

Level 1: Preconventional reasoning—the lowest

level of moral development, at which moral thinking is

often tied to punishment

1. Obedience and punishment orientation

2. Self-interest orientation ( What's in it for me?)

Level 2: Conventional reasoning—an intermediate

level during which individuals abide by certain

standards (internal), but they are the standards of

others (external), such as parents or the laws of

society

3. Interpersonal accord and conformity ( The

good boy/good girl attitude)

4. Authority and social-order maintaining

orientation ( Law and order morality)

Level 3: Postconventional reasoning—the highest

level of moral development, at which morality is more

internal; the individual recognizes alternative moral

courses, explores the options, and then decides on a

personal moral code

5. Social contract orientation

6. Universal ethical principles (Principled

conscience)

kholberg ways kids learn about reasoning

Before age 9, most children reason about moral dilemmas in a

preconventional way

• By early adolescence, they reason in more conventional ways

• By early adulthood, a small number of individuals reason in

postconventional ways

kohlberg on parenting

certain types of parent-child

experiences can induce the child and adolescent to think at

more advanced levels of moral reasoning

• Parents who allow or encourage conversation about value-laden

issues promote more advanced moral thought

• Unfortunately, many parents do not systematically provide their

children and adolescents with such experiences

related to parents discussion style

critics of kohlbergs

Kohlberg’s theory: Has been criticized for placing too

much emphasis on moral thought and not enough

emphasis on moral behavior

• Moral reasons: Can always be a shelter for immoral behavior

• Less advanced moral reasoning in adolescence related to

antisocial behavior and delinquenc

Parents play more important roles in children’s and

adolescents’ moral development than Kohlberg

envisioned

people who critiszie kholberg

Jonathan Haidt: Argues that a major flaw in Kohlberg’s

theory is the view that moral thinking is deliberative

and that individuals go around all the time

contemplating and reasoning about morality

• Haidt believes that most moral thinking is more of an intuitive

gut reaction and the deliberative moral reasoning is often an

after-the-fact justification

Carol Gilligan, who argues that Kohlberg’s

theory reflects a gender bias

• Kohlberg’s theory is based on a male norm that puts abstract

principles above relationships and takes a justice

perspective toward morality

Carol Gilligan

Kohlberg’s theory is based on a male norm that puts abstract

principles above relationships and takes a justice

perspective toward morality

• Gilligan argues for a care perspective, which views people in

terms of their connectedness and concern for others

• Gilligan believed that Kohlberg greatly underplayed the care

perspective, perhaps because he was a male, because most

of his research was with males rather than females, and

because he used male responses as a model for his theory

haidts theory of moral foundations

Care: cherishing and protecting others; opposite of

harm

Fairness or proportionality: rendering justice

according to shared rules; opposite of cheating

Loyalty or ingroup: standing with your group,

family, nation; opposite of betrayal

Authority or respect: submitting to tradition and

legitimate authority; opposite of subversion

Sanctity or purity: abhorrence for disgusting things,

foods, actions; opposite of degradation

higher order clusters of hiadts theory

The person-focused Individualizing cluster of Care

and Fairness, and

The group-focused Binding cluster of Loyalty,

Authority and Sanctity.

poltiical ideolgy and haidts theory

Liberals consistently showed greater endorsement and use of the Harm/care and Fairness/reciprocity foundations compared to the other 3 foundations

• Conservatives endorsed and used the 5 foundations more

equally.”

basic processes for morals

Reinforcement, punishment, and imitation: Have been

invoked to explain how and why adolescents learn

certain moral behaviors and why their behaviors differ

from one another

• The effectiveness of reinforcement and punishment depends

on how consistently they are administered and the schedule

that is adopted

• The effectiveness of modeling depends on the characteristics

of the model and the presence of cognitive processes to

enhance retention of the modeled behavior

behaviorlaists say what about moral behvaior

situationally dependent

• In a classic investigation, adolescents were more likely to

cheat when their friends pressured them to do so and when

the chance of being caught was slim

• Other analyses suggest that some adolescents are more

likely to lie, cheat, and steal than others—an indication of

more consistency of moral behavior in some adolescents

than in others

operant conditioning

is pos or neg reinforcmenet more powerful

positive overall

social cognitive theory on more development

emphasizes a distinction between adolescents’ moral

competence and moral performance

• Moral competence: the ability to produce moral behaviors;

primarily an outgrowth of cognitive-sensory processes

• Moral performance: performing those behaviors in specific

situations; determined by motivation and incentives to act in a

specific moral way

albert bandura view on social cog on moral

In Albert Bandura’s view, self-regulation rather

than abstract reasoning is the key to positive

moral development

prosocial behavior

involve altruism, an unselfish

interest in helping another person

• Although adolescents have often been described as

egocentric and selfish, adolescent acts of altruism are,

nevertheless, plentiful

• Altruism

• Public

• Emotional

• Dire

• Anonymous

• Compliant

Forgiveness: an aspect of prosocial behavior that

occurs when the injured person releases the injurer

from possible behavioral retaliation

Gratitude: a feeling of thankfulness and appreciation,

especially in response to someone doing something

kind or helpful

moral in psycoanalytic theory

the moral branch of the

personality—develops in early childhood when the

child resolves the Oedipus conflict

• Being self-punitive and feeling guilt keeps children, and later

adolescents, from committing transgressions

• Ego ideal: the component of the superego that involves

standards approved by the parents

• Conscience: the component of the superego that involves

behaviors not approved of by parents

the dark triad

machiavellianism

people who score high on this trait are cynical (in an

amoral self-interest sense, not in a doubtful or skeptical sense), unprincipled, and cold, believe in interpersonal manipulation as the key for life success, and behave accordingly. Scores on measures of Machiavellianism correlate negatively with agreeableness (r = −.47) and conscientiousness (r = −.34). Machiavellianism is also significantly correlated with psychopathy

narcissim

Individuals who score high on narcissism display grandiosity,

entitlement, dominance, and superiority. Narcissism has been found to correlate positively with extraversion (r = .42) and openness (r = .38) and negatively with agreeableness (r = −.36). Narcissism has also been found to have a significant correlation with psychopathy.

psycopathy

Considered the most malevolent of the dark triad, individuals who score high on psychopathy show low levels of empathy combined with high levels of impulsivity and thrill-seeking. Psychopathy has been found to correlate with all of the Big Five personality factors: extraversion (r = .34), agreeableness (r = −.25), conscientiousness (r = −.24), neuroticism (r = −.34), and openness (r = .24).

erik erikson on moral dev

• Specific moral learning in childhood

• Ideological concerns in adolescence

• Ethical consolidation in adulthood

moral identity

an aspect of personality that is present

when individuals have moral notions and commitments

that are central to their lives

• Behaving in a manner that violates this moral commitment

places the integrity of the self at risk

moral personality ( people in it )

James Rest

Darcia Narváez: A mature moral individual cares

about morality and being a moral person

Sam Hardy and colleagues: Identity is a way of

caring about morality

Moral identity predicts five health outcomes:

anxiety, depression, hazardous alcohol use, sexual

risk-taking, and self-esteem

james rest

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

• Moral motivation involves prioritizing moral values over

other personal values.

what characterizes moral exemplars

• Brave: characterized by being dominant and extraverted

• Caring: characterized by being nurturant and agreeable

• Just: characterized by being conscientious and open to

experience

social domain theory

states that there are different

domains of social knowledge and reasoning, including

moral, social conventional, and personal domains

According to social domain theory, key aspects of

morality involve judgments about welfare, justice, and

the rights and struggles individuals have with moral

issues in their social lives

elliot turiel

Social conventional reasoning focuses on conventional

rules that have been established by social consensus in

order to control behavior and maintain the social system

Children construct moral concepts based on social

interactions that involve violations of welfare or justice

Social convention and morality are distinguished.

The social conventional approach is a serious challenge to

Kohlberg’s approach because Kohlberg argued that social

conventions are a stop-over on the road to higher moral

sophistication

contexts of moral dev in parenting

Discipline techniques:

• Love withdrawal: a parent withholds attention or love

from the adolescent

• Power assertion: a parent attempts to gain control over

the adolescent or the adolescent’s resources

• Induction: a parent uses reason and explains how

antisocial activities are likely to affect others

Induction appears to be more positively related to moral

development than is love withdrawal or power assertion,

although the findings vary according to developmental level

and socioeconomic status

schools and moral devleopment

Values clarification: a second approach to providing

moral education that 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 understand the values of others

Service learning: A form of education that promotes

social responsibility and service to the community

• Adolescents become less self-centered and more strongly

motivated to help others

• Service learning benefits adolescents in a number of ways:

• Higher grades

• Increased goal setting

• Higher self-esteem

• Improved sense of being able to make a difference for others

• Increased likelihood that they will serve as volunteers in the future

Darcia Narváez

emphasizes an integrative approach

to moral education that encompasses:

• The reflective moral thinking and commitment to justice

advocated in Kohlberg’s approach

• Developing a particular moral character as advocated in the

character education approach

william damon

concluded that a major difficulty confronting today’s

youth is their lack of a clear sense of what they want to

do with their lives

• Too many youth are essentially “rudderless”

• He argues their goals and values too often focus on the short

term

In Damon’s view, one long-standing source for

discovering purpose in life is religion

pamela king and religion

• Religion is an organized set of beliefs, practices, rituals,

and symbols that increases an individual’s connection to

a sacred or transcendent other

• Religiousness refers to the degree of affiliation with an

organized religion, participation in its prescribed rituals

and practices, connection with its beliefs, and

involvement in a community of believers

• Spirituality involves experiencing something beyond

oneself in a transcendent manner and living in a way that

benefits other and society