The current study examined relations between distinct aspects of moral functioning, and their cognitive and emotional correlates, in preschool age children. Participants were 171 typically developing 3- to 6-year-olds. Each child completed several tasks, including (a) moral tasks assessing both performance of various moral actions and evaluations…

This study investigated differences in children's and adolescents' experiences of harming their siblings and friends. Participants ("N" = 101; 7-, 11-, and 16-year-olds) provided accounts of events when they hurt a younger sibling and a friend. Harm against friends was described as unusual, unforeseeable, and circumstantial. By contrast,…

A theory of the assignment of moral responsibility and punishment for harm was tested with 5- to 11-year-old children. Results indicated sophisticated use of moral concepts from 5 years. Developmental trends suggested increasing sensitivity to these concepts, greater tolerance for harm doing, and more emphasis on restitution than punishment.…

Two studies used a modification of the weakly interpretive scoring method of Langford and D'Cruz to examine judicial and legislative reasoning. Findings were in accord with modified versions of Piaget's and Kohlberg's views and contradicted Gibbs' theory. There were three stages of legislative reasoning between 7 and 21 years: heteronomy or…

Studied the emotional attributions which 60 children aged four-eight gave to a story figure who violated a moral rule. Results suggested a clear change from outcome-oriented toward morally oriented attributions to a moral wrongdoer between the different age groups. (RJC)

Examined 6-, 8-, and 10-year olds' conceptions of flags as social conventions and their understandings of the symbolic and psychological consequences associated with transgressions toward flags. Found that despite age-related increases in understanding of flags as meaningful collective symbols, children at all ages considered transgressions to be…

Videotaped stories depicting deliberate lies and unintentionally untrue statements were presented to 200 subjects evenly divided into the following age groups: 5, 8, 9, 11 years, and adult. Definitions of lying were seen to change gradually over this age range. (Author/RH)

The moral realism of everyday life is neither Piaget's childlike egocentrism nor Gabennesch's reification. Natural moral law is seen by Turiel, a cognitivist, as a code of harm, rights, and justice. Other cognitivists accept codes of duty and natural order. (BC)

Moral judgments are an important aspect of social reasoning, not arbitrary products of social formations. Maintains that Gabennesch relegates moral concepts to reification, failing to account for the distinctions between conventionality and moral concepts. (BC)

Examines the relationship of moral judgement to moral action as well as to certain cognitive style variables. A total of 134 male and female eleventh- and twelfth-graders completed measures of moral judgement, field dependence-independence, and other variables, and nominated teachers who then rated the students for tendency to evidence morally…

Examined children's obligatory moral judgments, which reflect a moral requirement, and discretionary moral judgments, which reflect moral worthiness but not a requirement. Children were interviewed in response to three stories that entailed positive and negative morality. Results showed that moral acts conceived of by children as being obligatory…

Examines several issues arising from two differing approaches to morality--Kohlberg's theory of moral reasoning development and Gilligan's theory of moral orientations. (PCB)

Investigated how children's decisions about allocating money to story characters were affected by the relationship (friends versus strangers) among the characters. Children's rationales for their decisions showed that equality was the most salient principle for decisions at all ages and that older children provided rationales based on benevolence…

Examined the relationships between certain socialization experiences and social judgments among 54 inner-city, African American kindergartners from low-income families. Results indicated that in evaluating transgressions children distinguished between moral and social-conventional issues when explaining why they were wrong and in terms of rule and…

Two studies of third, sixth, and ninth graders were conducted to determine whether the children made judgments about both justice and interpersonal relations in conflict situations. Results demonstrate that concerns with justice and interpersonal relationships coexist in judgments of male and female children. The ways in which these concerns are…