Children's thinking about diversity of belief in 4 realms morality, taste, facts, and ambiguous facts was examined. Ninety-six participants (ages 5, 7, and 9) were interviewed about beliefs different from their own that were endorsed by characters with different status; their judgments of relativism, tolerance, and disagreeing persons were…

While abiding by the injunction against deriving "ought" statements from "is" statements, the author considers ways in which the "is" bears on the "ought." Persons, it is proposed, make moral judgments and decisions about the world as they understand it to be.

Interviewed 3-, 5-, and 7-year olds about events in which a character commits potentially harmful or unfair acts based on moral beliefs or informational beliefs not shared by participants, or based on informational beliefs shared by participants. Found that children accounted for informational beliefs in their judgments, but that children…

Notes that moral decisions include both moral concepts and factual beliefs. Considers possible sources of variation in factual beliefs and presents research into children's and adults' thinking about practices based on factual beliefs different from their own. Discusses how individuals take these differences into account when judging the seemingly…

Examined third- and seventh-graders' and college students' thinking regarding different types of disagreements. Found that participants' thinking was constrained by the realm and form of the disagreement. At all ages, participants judged some disagreements acceptable and others unacceptable, described disagreements based on different attributes,…

Sixth and tenth graders and college students were asked to apply moral judgments which they had made about a familiar context to contexts in cultures different from their own. Most subjects contextualized their judgments with respect to cultures with different informational beliefs but made nonrelativistic judgments with respect to cultures with…

Examined tolerance of children's, adolescents', and young adults' judgments about dissenting beliefs, speech, practices, and people engaged in those practices. Found that tolerance of dissenting beliefs and speech increased with age. Tolerance was most common with dissenting beliefs, then speech, persons engaged in the practice, and the practice…

Makes a case for rereading the fact-value dichotomy that currently divides the contemporaneous literatures dealing with children's moral reasoning development and their evolving theories of mind. Presents findings from two research programs, in which children's beliefs about truth and rightness are combined, to illustrate the natural…

Argues that the individualistic-collectivistic dichotomy results in mislabeling both cultures and individuals. Discusses ways in which individualistic concerns with independence and collectivistic concerns with interdependence coexist in Western and non-Western cultures. Outlines a theoretical framework explaining the coexistence of diverse social…

Examined differences in moral judgments as they relate to informational assumptions. Sixth graders, high school seniors, and college students evaluated events concerning welfare, justice, and rights and reevaluated them in light of the opposite information. The relation between evaluations and informational assumptions was significant within each…