Remember….

 Basket – Theory of
mind in place
 Box – Theory of mind
not in place
Lawrence Kholberg
Lawrence Kohlberg
 Inspired by the work of Piaget
 Moral reasoning progresses sequentially
through a series of developmental stages

 Method was to use moral dilemmas (ex.

Heinz) to investigate children’s reasoning

 Identified six stages (2 per level)

Method
 72 Chicago boys aged 10–16 years, 58 of
whom were followed up at three-yearly
intervals for 20 years (Kohlberg, 1984).
 One two-hour interview based on ten
hypothetical moral dilemmas
 Studied the answers and was mainly
interested in were the reasons for their
decisions, not whether the boys judged the
actions wrong or right
 reasons tended to change as the children got
older.
Kohlberg’s Stages – Fill in the
blanks…
Right vs wrong
Postconventional
level is decided by
universal values

Right vs wrong
Conventional depends on following
level
rules and laws

Right vs wrong
Preconventional depends on whether you get
level
punished or rewarded
 Moral Development - Kohlberg
 Preconventional
 Children have little awareness of moral behavior that is
socially or culturally acceptable
 Rules are something they have to follow because others
tell them to but they do not truly believe in the rules

 Stage 1: Punishment - Obedience

 Behaviour is based on fear of consequences – ‘Will I get
into trouble?’

 Stage 2: Naively Egotistical

 This is the ‘What will you give me?’ stage – in order for
them to obey, they want something in return.
Moral Development - Kohlberg
 Conventional
 Stage 3: Approval – Disapproval
 Do the right thing so as to be seen as a good person

 “What will people think of me?”

 Stage 4: Rule Following – Law & Order

 Do the right thing out of sense of duty may want to steal
but must follow law
 What is right and wrong is determined by our social
institutions (law, school, church) and we must conform
to maintain social order – no questioning!
Moral Development - Kohlberg
 Post-conventional – developing true morality
 Stage 5: Social Contract
 The needs of the group should come before individual
needs.
 The right behavior is that which protects the rights of
the individual according to rules agreed upon by the
whole society

 Stage 6: Universal Ethical Principle

 Self-determined moral ideas based on justice, dignity and
equality (involves critical evaluation of the laws)
 Kohlberg’s Question ????
In Europe, a woman was near death from cancer. One drug
might save her, a form of radium that a druggist in the same
town had recently discovered. The druggist was charging
$90,000, ten times what the drug cost him to make. The sick
woman’s husband, Heinz, went to everyone he knew to borrow
the money, but could only get together about half of what it
cost. He told the druggist that his wife was dying and asked him
to sell it cheaper or let him pay later. But the druggist said,
“No” The husband later broke into the man’s store to steal the
drug for his wife. (Kohlberg 1969)
Should the husband have done that? Why? Or why not?
Other questions Kholberg
would ask:
 1. Should Heinz have stolen the drug?
2. Would it change anything if Heinz did not
love his wife?
3. What if the person dying was a stranger,
would it make any difference?
4. Should the police arrest the chemist for
murder if the woman died?
Preconventional
 In this stage, the child has not internalized moral
values - children obey because adults tell them to
and they know that they will be punished if they don’t
and/or rewarded if they do.

 Possible response:
 Heinz shouldn’t have stolen the drug because he will
go to jail
 He should do it as long as he doesn’t get caught
 It’s important to note that their moral thinking is based on
self-interest. Children in this stage will obey when it is best
for them to obey.
Conventional
 Older children are at an intermediate level of
internalization where they see rules as needed to
maintain social order.
 Typically in early adolescence, there is reliance on
interpersonal norms of trust, caring, and loyalty to
make moral judgments

 Possible responses:
 Heinz should have stolen the drug because that is
what is expected of him as a husband.
 It may be good for Heinz to want to steal to help his
wife, but it is still wrong because stealing is against the
law
Post-conventional
 Moral development is completely internalized
supported by the ability to recognize alternative moral
courses, explore options, and personal moral codes
 The individual weighs the community rights versus
personal rights. Values and laws are relative and
standards may vary but some values (such as
freedom) are more important than the law

 Possible responses:
 The law wasn’t set up for circumstances such as the
ones presented and so Heinz has the right to steal the
drug.
 Heinz shouldn’t steal the drug as the druggist may stop
manufacturing cancer fighting drugs and then many
people would die
Post-conventional…
 They see a justification for technically illegal behavior
when it is in the best interest of society to save a
human life, for example.

 They also make moral judgments based on

universal human rights.
 During an ethical dilemma between law and
conscience – a personal, individual conscience is
followed.
Stage 6 example
 At 24, Richard says: "A human life takes precedence
over any other moral or legal value, whoever it is. A
human life has inherent value whether or not it is
valued by a particular individual. The worth of the
individual human being is central where the principles
of justice and love are normative for all human
relationships."
 Stage 6 in seeing the value of human life as absolute
in representing a universal and equal respect for the
human as an individual. He has moved step by step
through a sequence culminating in a definition of
human life as centrally valuable rather than derived
from or dependent on social or divine authority.
Criticisms of Kohlberg
 The dilemmas lack ecological validity
 Life situations that children would not have
encountered
 Hypothetical nature brings questions to the validity
 What you say you would do and what you actually
do may differ when there are real consequences
 Inherent Western bias (individualistic culture)
 Unclear that there are set stages
 Different stories elicited responses at different levels
 Gender bias - Masculine point of view
 detached reasoning rather than including
emotional considerations
Carol Gilligan
Gilligan’s Moral Stages

 Gilligan’s theory of moral development includes 3

general phases (stages) which humans can develop.
They are:
 morality as individual survival
 morality as self-sacrifice
 morality as equality

 Gilligan’s theory is often considered to be a

feminist view of moral development.
Gilligan expanded
 Morality as individual survival
 The young child’s first sense of what is good
for them. Young children follow rules to obtain
rewards for themselves and avoid punishment
 Morality as self-sacrifice
 This is attained after becoming aware of the
needs of others. In this stage, the person
believes that to be good and to be approved of
by others, they must sacrifice their own needs
and meet the needs of others
Gilligan expanded
 Morality as equality
 the person views their own needs as equal to
those of others.
 People at this stage have progressed from
believing that they must always please others
at the expense of their own wishes to a belief
that everyone’s needs should be met when
possible – sacrifices should be shared
equally when the needs of all cannot be met
 This involves advocacy of non-violence