week 8: moral development and child deception

morality =

• belief that some behaviour is right and some is wrong

• system of principles/values concerning people’s behaviour - generally accepted by society or a certain group

• how right/acceptable something is

• time and culture specifies:

  • what is and isn’t legal/illegal

  • what behaviours to prioritise in context

  • how to judge different models of behaviour

• models of morality:

  • communal sharing = protection of intimate personal relationships

  • authority ranking = obedience to authority’s will is moral

  • equality matching = fairness is strict equality and balanced reciprocity

  • market pricing = utilitarian - greatest good for greatest number

conventional vs moral rules

• conventional

  • arbitrary created by a particular group/culture

  • only need to follow when with that group/in given situations

• moral

  • universal and obligatory

  • basic principles of the rights of others

• children judge rule breaking of moral rules more seriously/harshly than conventional rules

children developing morality

• should we condemn or reframe immoral behaviour?

• are moral expectations based on morality or convention?

• what does bad/naughty or good/nice mean?

• what criteria does santa use?

3 dimensions of moral development

• moral emotions = guided by development/experience of emotions

  • eg guilt/shame/empathy

• moral behaviour = determined by how we act and imitate the actions of others

• moral reasoning = determined by thought processes and how we judge and reason

moral emotions

• freud’s psychoanalytic theory = identification with same sex parent and internalisation of moral rules of that parent in order to create superego

  • disobeying of conscience = guilt

  • disappointing of superego = shame

  • erikson - compliance = pride

• self conscious emotions develop before 6, but understanding of shame develops as children age

• before 7, children only feel guilt if caught

• after that decide not to do something because of the guilt

• important to consider roles of empathy and sympathy

  • discipline promotes prosocial behaviour

  • focus on how someone else is feeling

  • culturally dependent - more westernised values

moral behaviour

• skinner - operant conditioning

  • consequences lead to obedience to moral rules

  • rewarding moral behaviour leads to an increase in that behaviour

  • punishing immoral behaviour decreases that behaviour

• power assertion effects - coercive/restrictive/firm discipline)

  • physical threats - smacking

    • relationship with that and substance misuse

    • more aggressive behaviour is ineffective

      • leads to social learning and replication

    • serious long term health implications

  • love withdrawal

    • withhold love and affection until child conforms

      • doesn’t work (obviously)

      • fear of loss of love results in denial of guilt to regulate overwhelming emotions - they can’t process the guilt

      • children are normally connection seeking - you’re shouting at them but you’re interacting with them and that’s what they want

• inductive discipline = highlight consequences, why behaviour is wrong and how we can fix it

• bandura - social learning theory = replace rewards/punishment with an observation of others receiving reward/punishment

  • children are likely to observe/imitate prosocial and antisocial behaviour

  • relationship maintenance

    • creates a positive relationship to be a more attractive role model for the child to imitate

  • depends on selection of good models

  • depends on what is possible to imitate

moral reasoning - piaget

making judgements about rightness/wrongness

• moral realism (under 8)

  • rules come from authority, cannot be changed and result in punishment if violated

• moral relativism (over 8)

  • possible to agree to change rules if everyone follows them

  • punishment for violations depends on intentions

• before age 8 children do not understand why they should follow moral rules, so behaviour is often inconsistent

• after 8 children give more weight to intentions vs consequences

• depends on cultural value systems

• command strategy - compliance indicates recognition of and respect for authority

moral reasoning - kohlberg

stage 1-3 overlaps w piaget

stage 4-6 extends piaget

• punishment/obedience - obeying authority and avoiding punishment

• instrumental purpose - exchange is possible but it must be equal

• good boy/good girl - people act morally to maintain social harmony

• social order maintaining - people want to act morally to maintain social harmony as a whole

• social contract - when laws do not further human purpose they should be changed fairly, happy to follow laws as long as they’re in line w individual rights/interest

• universal ethical principle - ethical principles

Not androcentric (Turiel, 2006) but important to consider impact of
moral orientations (Gilligan, 1982)
• Support for stage-like sequence (Walker, 1991)
• Stressed the importance of social environment in nurturing moral
development (age-appropriate parental responses to less mature
forms of moral reasoning)
• Modest link between moral thought and action (e.g., cognitive
dissonance) but inconsistently linked (e.g., moral disengagement
– Bandura, 2002; Krebs & Denton, 2005)
• Hypothetical dilemmas not reflective of everyday life
• Culturally-limiting
• Moral maturity possible at Stages 3-4 (Gibbs, 2010) but perhaps
undervalued if Stages 5-6 are rare?

see slides for each stage’s pro stealing/anti stealing approach

deception = successful/unsuccessful deliberate attempt, without forewarning, to create belief which the communicator believes to be untrue

• first order deception - understanding that people have different thoughts to my own so i can create a false belief - 2.5-4.5 yo

• second order deception - inferring what one person thinks about another person’s thoughts 6-7 yo

• prosocial lies = other oriented/polite lies protecting another from harm

• antisocial lies = self serving lies to protect oneself

• social understanding of lies

  • parents of 3-6 yo perceive prosocial lies as most acceptable

  • acceptability of lying goes from categorically wrong at 8-9 to okay under certain circumstances eg polite lie

moral emotions to explain child deception

• children internalise parents’ moral standards about lying

• link between guilt and deception is unclear

moral behaviour to explain child deception

• children influenced by role model

• truth can be promoted by models in moral stories

• anticipated punishment for telling the truth can increase lie telling behaviour

moral reasoning to explain child deception

• social understanding of lying increases and becomes more flexible with age

• decision making precedes action but has very little predictive power between children under and over 8