Kohlberg’s Theory

of
Moral Development
Moral Development
Moral development
is the gradual
development of an
individuals concept
of right or wrong –
conscious, religious
values, social
attitudes and certain
behaviour.
Kohlberg's theory
 This theory is a stage theory. In other words, everyone goes through
the stages sequentially without skipping any stage.

 However, movement through these stages are not natural, that is

people do not automatically move from one stage to the next as they
mature. In stage development, movement occurs when a person
notices inadequacies in his or her present way of coping with a given
moral dilemma.

 According to stage theory, people cannot understand moral reasoning

more than one stage ahead of their own. For example, a person in
Stage 1 can understand Stage 2 reasoning but nothing beyond that.
Kohlberg’s Six Stages

Pre-Conventional Moral Development

Stage 1
Stage 2
Conventional Moral Development
Stage 3
Stage 4
Post-Conventional Moral
Development
Stage 5
Stage 6
Level 1 (Pre-Conventional)
 Child’s level. (However, some adults act out of this level.)
 People at this level judge the morality of an action by its direct
consequences.
 solely concerned with the self in an egocentric manner.
 Person has not yet adopted or internalized society's
conventions regarding what is right or wrong, but instead
focuses largely on external consequences that certain actions
may bring
1. Punishment avoidance and Obedience orientation
(How can I avoid punishment?)

2. Exchange of Favors: Self-interest orientation

(What's in it for me?)
(Paying for a benefit)
 Level 2 (Conventional)
 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.
 At this level an individual obeys rules and follows society's
norms even when there are no consequences for obedience
or disobedience.
 Adherence to rules and conventions is somewhat rigid,
however.
3. Good Boy/Good girl: Interpersonal
accord and conformity
(Social norms)
(The good boy/good girl attitude)
4. Law & Order: Authority and social-order
maintaining orientation
(Law and order morality)
Level 3 (Post-Conventional)
 There is a growing realization that individuals are separate
entities from society, and that the individual’s own perspective
may take precedence over society’s view; they may disobey
rules inconsistent with their own principles.
 These people live by their own abstract principles about right
and wrong—principles that typically include such basic human
rights as life, liberty, and justice. Because of this level’s “nature
of self before others”, the behavior of post-conventional
individuals, especially those at stage six, can be confused with
that of those at the pre-conventional level.

5. Social contract orientation

6. Universal ethical principles
(Principled conscience)
Effect of Kohlberg’s theory
in teaching
• Development in Perspective
The developmental-philosophic strategy in contrast with some other
approaches can deal with two persistent problems: the ethical
question of having a standard of non-relative or universal value and
factual questions of prediction.

• Development as the Aim of Education

So far we have attempted to clarify and justify the basic claim that
developmental criteria are the best ones for defining educationally
important behaviour changes. We need now to clarify how the
psychological study of development can concretely define
educational goals. A common criticism is that the concept of
development is too vague to clarify genuinely the choice of the
curricular content and aims of education.
1. Moral teacher should be teaching according to their child's
level.
2. Action, consequences, rewards and punishments.
3. Use simple family situation,life situation for moral concept.
4. Teaching methods in moral education such as story
telling,role play or drama,visiting to OKU centres and old
folks.