Keith E Rice - Stages of Moral Development

Lawrence Kohlberg's Stages of Moral Development constitute an adaptation of a psychological theory originally conceived of by Swiss psychologist Jean Piaget. Kohlberg, while a Psychology postgraduate student at the University of Chicago, expanded and then developed Piaget’s concepts throughout the course of his life.

The theory holds that moral reasoning, the basis for ethical behaviour, has 6 identifiable developmental stages, each more adequate at responding to moral dilemmas than its predecessor. Kohlberg followed the development of moral judgment far beyond the ages studied earlier by Piaget (1932) who also claimed that logic and morality develop through constructive stages. Expanding on Piaget's work, Kohlberg (1963) determined that the process of moral development was principally concerned with justice and that it continued throughout the individual's lifetime - a notion that spawned dialogue on the philosophical implications of such research.

Kohlberg’s methodology used the Moral Judgement Interview he had first developed for his 1958 dissertation with 72 boys aged between 10 and 16, both working class and middle class in Chicago. During the roughly 2-hour tape recorded semi-structured interview, the interviewer uses 10 moral dilemmas to determine which stage of moral reasoning a person uses. The 10 universal moral issues or values Kohlberg used are property, law, roles and concerns of affection, roles and concerns of authority, life, liberty, distributive justice, truth and sex. The dilemmas are fictional short stories that describe situations in which a person has to make a moral decision, choosing between 2 (or more) moral principles. The participant is asked a systemic series of open-ended questions, like what they think the right course of action is, as well as justifications as to why certain actions are right or wrong. The form and structure of these replies are scored and not the content; over a set of multiple moral dilemmas an overall score is derived. Probably the most famous of Kohlberg’s stories was the ‘Heinz Dilemma’...

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?

Kohlberg was interested in how individuals would justify their actions if placed in such moral dilemmas. He analysed the form of moral reasoning displayed, rather than its conclusion and classified it as belonging to one of 6 distinct stages generally grouped into 3 levels of 2 stages each: Pre-Conventional, Conventional and Post-Conventional. An individual‘s reasoning on each dilemma might be at a different level but overall their reasoning tended to be at one discrete level. Kohlberg stated that stages cannot be skipped; each provides a new and necessary perspective, more comprehensive and differentiated than its predecessors but integrated with them. It represents a more equilibriated form of moral reasoning, resulting in more logically consistent reasoning. Moral maturity is achieved through biological maturation, disequilibrium (noticing weaknesses in current thinking) and gains in perspective taking (understanding another’s viewpoint). Due to these factors, Kohlberg thought it extremely rare to regress backward in stages - to lose the use of higher stage abilities.

Pre-Conventional

The Pre-Conventional level of moral reasoning is especially common in children, although adults can also exhibit this level of reasoning. Reasoners at this level judge the morality of an action by its direct consequences. The Pre-Conventional level consists of the first and second stages of moral development, and is solely concerned with the self in an egocentric manner.

In Stage 1 (obedience and punishment driven), individuals focus on the direct consequences of their actions on themselves. For example, an action is perceived as morally wrong because the perpetrator is punished. "The last time I did that I got spanked so I will not do it again." The worse the punishment for the act is, the more ‘bad’ the act is perceived to be. This can give rise to an inference that even innocent victims are guilty in proportion to their suffering. This view is egocentric, lacking recognition that others' points of view are different from one's own. There is a deference to superior power or prestige. Obedience is not valued for its own sake.

Stage 2 (self-interest/reward driven) espouses the "what's in it for me" position, in which right behaviour is defined by whatever is in the individual's best interest - ie: what will bring reward. Stage two reasoning shows a limited interest in the needs of others, but only to a point where it might further the individual's own interests. As a result, concern for others is not based on loyalty or intrinsic respect, but rather a "you scratch my back, and I'll scratch yours" mentality. The lack of a societal perspective in the Pre-conventional level is quite different from the ‘social contract’ (Stage 5), as all actions have the purpose of serving the individual's own needs or interests. For the Stage 2 theorist, the world's perspective is often seen as morally relative.

Conventional

The Conventional level of moral reasoning is typical of adolescents and adults. Those who reason in a Conventional way judge the morality of actions by comparing them to society's views and expectations. The views of others are now considered. The Conventional level consists of the third and fourth stages of moral development.

In Stage 3 (interpersonal accord and conformity driven), the self enters society by filling social roles. Individuals are receptive to approval or disapproval from others as it reflects society's accordance with the perceived role. They try to be a ‘good boy’ or ‘good girl’ to live up to these expectations, having learned that there is inherent value in doing so. Stage 3 reasoning may judge the morality of an action by evaluating its consequences in terms of a person's relationships, which now begin to include things like respect, gratitude and the ‘golden rule’ (reciprocity of just treatment). "I want to be liked and thought well of; apparently, not being naughty makes people like me." Desire to maintain rules and authority exists only to further support these social roles. The intentions of actions play a more significant role in reasoning at this stage; "they mean well ...".

In Stage 4 (authority and social order obedience driven), it is important to obey laws, dictums and social conventions because of their importance in maintaining a functioning society. Moral reasoning in Stage 4 is thus beyond the need for individual approval exhibited in Stage 3; society must learn to transcend individual needs. A central ideal or ideals often prescribe what is right and wrong, such as in the case of fundamentalism. If one person violates a law, perhaps everyone would - thus, there is an obligation and a duty to uphold laws and rules. When someone does violate a law, it is morally wrong; culpability is thus a significant factor in this stage as it separates the bad domains from the good ones. Most active members of modern Western society don’t usually get past Stage 4 where morality is still predominantly dictated by an outside force.

Post-Conventional

The Post-Conventional level, also known as the ‘principled level’, consists of Stages 5 and 6 of moral development. There is a growing realisation that individuals are separate entities from society and that the individual's own perspective may take precedence over society's view. Because of this level's "nature of self before others", the behaviour of Post-Conventional individuals, especially those at Stage 6, can be confused with that of those at the Pre-Conventional level.

In Stage 5 (social contract driven), individuals are viewed as holding different opinions and values. Similarly, laws are regarded as ‘social contracts’ rather than rigid dictums. Those which do not promote the general welfare should be changed when necessary to meet "the greatest good for the greatest number of people". This is achieved through majority decision, and inevitable compromise. Thus, democratic government is ostensibly based on Stage 5 reasoning.

In Stage 6 (universal ethical principles driven), moral reasoning is based on abstract reasoning using universal ethical principles. Laws are valid only insofar as they are grounded in justice, and a commitment to justice carries with it an obligation to disobey unjust laws. Rights are unnecessary, as social contracts are not essential for deontic moral action. Decisions are not reached hypothetically in a conditional way but rather categorically in an absolute way, as in the philosophy of Immanuel Kant. This involves an individual imagining what they would do in another's shoes, if they believed what that other person imagines to be true. The resulting consensus is the action taken. In this way action is never a means but always an end in itself; the individual acts because it is right, and not because it is instrumental, expected, legal, or previously agreed upon. Although Kohlberg insisted that Stage 6 exists, he found it difficult to identify a sufficient mass of individuals who consistently operated at that level for him to claim statistical significance in all his studies.

Changes over Time

In 1983 Anne Colby, Kohlberg, John Gibbs & Marcus Lieberman reported on the original 1963 group of 72 boys, having tested them 6 times at 3-yearly intervals in those 20 years. The results are graphed below.

At age 10 the boys displayed mainly Stage 2 but there were examples of Stages 1 and 3. By the age of 22 no one used Stage 1 reasoning and Stages 3 and 4 were predominant. By the age of 36 and the end of the study, there was only marginal evidence of Stage 5 reasoning (around 5%).

In 1976 James P Shaver & William Strong raised the question of whether most people develop beyond Stage 4.

If, as in Integrated SocioPsychology, Kohlberg’s stages are seen as the outputs of vMEMES processing moral issues - see Comparison Map - then it would be expected that there would be a developmental hierarchy in the emergence of moral reasoning as people grow older and wiser in more complex circumstances (Life Conditions). If the Life Conditions do not require it, it is unlikely that more complex ways of reasoning would emerge.