“Moral development concerns with rules and conventions about just interactions between people.

KOHLBERG'S STAGES OF MORAL DEVELOPMENT

Lawrence Kohlberg was a moral philosopher and student of child development. He was director of
Harvard's Center for Moral Education. His special area of interest is the moral development of children -
how they develop a sense of right, wrong, and justice.

 Kohlberg observed that growing children advance through definite stages of moral development
 His observations and testing of children and adults, led him to theorize that human beings progress
consecutively from one stage to the next in an invariant sequence, not skipping any stage or
going back to any previous stage.

 These are stages of thought processing, implying qualitatively different modes of thinking and of
problem solving at each stage.

Heinz dilemma

A dilemma that Kohlberg used in his original research was the druggist's dilemma: Heinz Steals the Drug In
Europe.

A woman was near death from a special kind of cancer. There was one drug that the doctors thought might
save her. It was a form of radium that a druggist in the same town had recently discovered. The drug was
expensive to make, but the druggist was charging ten times what the drug cost him to produce. He paid
$200 for the radium and charged $2,000 for a small dose of the drug. The sick woman's husband, Heinz,
went to everyone he knew to borrow the money, but he could only get together about $ 1,000, which is
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, I discovered the drug and I'm going to make money from it." So Heinz
got desperate and broke into the man's store to steal the drug for his wife. Should Heinz have broken into
the laboratory to steal the drug for his wife? Why or why not?

From a theoretical point of view, it is not important what the participant thinks that Heinz should do.
Kohlberg's theory holds that the justification the participant offers is what is significant, the form of their
response.

According to Kohlberg’s Theory of Moral Development, there are 6 stages of moral development,
separated into 3 levels: Pre-conventional, Conventional & Post Conventional

1. Pre-conventional/ Pre Moral STAGE 1: Punishment And Obedience

 Avoidance of physical punishment and deference to power.
- children are only interested in securing their own benefit. This is their idea of morality. They
begin by avoiding punishment, and quickly learn that they may secure other benefits by
pleasing others.
- The immediate physical consequences of an action determine its goodness or badness. During
the holocaust, the atrocities carried out by soldiers who were simply "carrying out orders"
under threat of punishment, illustrate that adults as well as children may function at stage one
level
 Questions: What must I do to avoid punishment? What can I do to force my will upon others?
2. STAGE 2: Instrumental Exchange: Individualism & Exchange

 Justice is: "Do unto others as they do unto you."

 Individual does what is necessary, makes concessions only as necessary to satisfy his own desires.
Right action consists of what instrumentally satisfies one's own needs.

 Vengeance is considered a moral duty. People are valued in terms of their utility. "An eye for an
eye."

 Questions: What's in it for me? What must I do to avoid pain, gain pleasure?

3. Conventional. STAGE 3: Interpersonal (Tribal) Conformity: Good Boy/Good Girl

 Right is conformity to the stereotypical behavioral values expectations of one's society or peers.
Individual acts to gain approval of others by being conventionally "respectable" and "nice."

 Good behavior is that which pleases or helps others within the group. Everybody is doing it.

 Sin is a breach of the expectations of one's immediate social order

 Individual vengeance is not allowed. Forgiveness is preferable to revenge

 Punishment is mainly for deterrence.

 Failure to punish is "unfair." "If he can get away with it, why can't I?"

 Question: What must I do to be seen as a good boy/girl (socially acceptable)?

4. STAGE 4: Law And Order (Societal Conformity): The Good Citizen

 Right behavior consists of maintaining the social order for its own sake. Self-sacrifice to larger social
order is expected.

 Respect for fixed rules, laws and properly constituted authority.

 Responsibility toward the welfare of others in the society.

 Justice demands that the wrongdoer be punished, that he "pay his debt to society," and that law
abiders be rewarded.

 Injustice is failing to reward work or punish demerit.

 Authority figures are seldom questioned. "He must be right. He's the Pope (or the President, or the
Judge, or God)." Consistency and precedent must be maintained.

 Question: What if everyone did that?

5. Post Conventional. STAGE 5: Prior Rights And Social Contract: The Philosopher/King

 Moral action in a specific situation is not defined by reference to a checklist of rules, but from
logical application of universal, abstract, moral principles
  Individual acts out of mutual obligation and a sense of public good. Right action tends to be defined
in terms of general individual rights, and in terms of standards that have been critically examined
and agreed upon by the whole society--e.g. the Constitution.

 morally right & legally right are not always the same

 The freedom of the individual should be limited by society only when it infringes upon someone
else's freedom.

 Retributive punishment is neither rational nor just, because it does not promote the rights and
welfare of the individual and inflicts further violence upon society

 Conventional authorities are increasingly rejected in favor of critical reasoning. Laws are challenged
by questions of justice

Questions: What is the just thing to do given all the circumstances? What will bring the most good to the
largest number of people?

6. STAGE 6: Universal Ethical Principles: The Prophet/Messiah

 Person at this stage acts out of universal principles based upon the equality and worth of all living
beings.

 Persons are never means to an end, but are ends in themselves

 Interests of others are as important as one’s own interests. This is the "Golden Rule" model

 A list of rules inscribed in stone is no longer necessary

 Abstract principles are the basis for moral decision making, not concrete rules.

 individuals at this stage are rare, often value their principles more than their own life, often seen as
incarnating the highest human potential. E.g Mohandas Gandhi, Gautam Buddha, Martin Luther
King, Jr

Questions: What will foster life in its fullest for all living beings? What is justice for all?

Observations That Were Made By Kohlberg Further Explaining Human Development In Stages.

1. Stage Development Is Invariant And Sequential.

One must progress through the stages in order, and one cannot get to a higher stage without passing through the
stage immediately preceding it. Higher stages incorporate the thinking and experience of all lower stages of
reasoning into current levels of reasoning but transcends them for higher levels. (e.g, Stage Four reasoning will
understand the reasoning of Stages 1-3 but will reason at a higher level) A belief that a leap into moral maturity is
possible is in sharp contrast to the facts of developmental research. Moral development is growth, and like all
growth, takes place according to a pre-determined sequence. To expect someone to grow into high moral maturity
overnight would be like expecting someone to walk before he crawls.

2. In Stage Development, Subjects Cannot Comprehend Moral Reasoning At A Stage More Than One
Stage Beyond Their Own.

If Johnny is oriented to see good almost exclusively as that which brings him satisfaction, how will he understand a
concept of good in which the "good" may bring him no tangible pleasure at all. The moral maxim "It is better to give
than to receive" reflects a high level of development. The child who honestly asks you why it is better to give than to
receive, does so because he does not and cannot understand such thinking. To him, "better" means better for him.
And how can it be better for him to give, than to get. Thus, higher stages can comprehend lower stages of reasoning
though they find it less compelling. But lower stages cannot comprehend higher stages of reasoning.

3. In Stage Development Individuals Are Cognitively Attracted To Reasoning One Level Above Their Own
Present Predominant Level.

The person has questions and problems the solutions for which are less satisfying at his present level. Since
reasoning at one stage higher is intelligible and since it makes more sense and resolves more difficulties,
it is more attractive. For example, two brothers both want the last piece of pie. The bigger, stronger
brother will probably get it. The little brother suggests they share it. He is thinking at level two, rather than
at level one. The solution for him is more attractive: getting some rather than none. An adult who functions
at level one consistently will end up in prison or dead.

4. In Stage Development, Movement Through The Stages Is Effected When Cognitive Disequilibrium Is
Created, i.e When A Person's Cognitive Outlook Is Not Adequate To Cope With A Given Moral Dilemma.

The person who is growing, will look for more and more adequate ways of solving problems. If he has no
problems, no dilemmas, he is not likely to look for solutions. He will not grow morally. (The Hero, prior to
his calling, lives in comfortable stagnation. Small towns are notorious for their low level "provincial"
reasoning). In the apple pie example. The big brother, who can just take the pie and get away with it, is less
likely to look for a better solution than the younger brother who will get none and probably a beating in
the struggle. Life crises often present opportunities for moral development. These include loss of one's
job, moving to another location, death of a significant other, unforeseen tragedies and disasters.

5. It Is Quite Possible For A Human Being To Be Physically Mature But Not Morally Mature

Development of moral reasoning is not automatic. It does not simply occur in tandem with chronological
aging. If a child is spoiled, never having to accommodate for other’s needs, if he is raised in an environment
where level two thinking by others gets the job done, he may never generate enough questions to propel
him to a higher level of moral reasoning. People who live in small towns or enclaves within larger cities and
never encounter those outside their tribal boundaries are unlikely to have cause to develop morally. One
key factor in development of moral reasoning is the regularity with which one encounters moral
dilemmas, even if only hypothetically. Kohlberg found that the vast majority of adults never develop past
conventional moral reasoning, the bulk of them coming to rest in either Stage 3 Tribal or Stage 4 Social
Conventional stages. This is partly because the reinforcement mechanisms of the "common sense" of
everyday life provided little reason or opportunity to confront moral dilemmas and thus one's own moral
reasoning.

Criticisms of Kohlberg’s Theory of Moral Development

 Kohlberg focused exclusively on male children in his studies of moral reasoning. Gilligan
concluded through a series of studies that males and females develop different standards of
morality. She claims that boys have a “justice perspective,” whereas girls have a “care and
responsibility perspective” when judging morality. Because of this, she criticizes Kohlberg’s model
for focusing on the male “justice perspective” and treating male rule-based reasoning as morally
superior
 Another problem with Kohlberg’s research is that he focused primarily on the development of
children in American, and it is still unclear as to whether or not his model applies to people in other
societies. Other moral and political cultures may not believe in certain principles. So, it does not
apply to collective cultures.
 There are also some studies that indicate that children as young as 6 can attain vague concepts of
universal ethical principles – they may be able to distinguish between a rule that says “no hitting”
(universal and moral) and one that says “kids must sit in a circle during story-time” (conventional,
arbitrary, and non-moral).