Kohlberg's cognitive moral reasoning

• What is Kohlberg's level of moral reasoning?

  • Proposed that criminal behaviour is based off of people's decisions and judgements of what is right and wrong
  • In 1973 he found that a group of violent youths were at a significantly lower level of moral development than non-violent youths including control for social background
• What are Kohlberg's 3 levels of moral reasoning?

  1. Pre-conventional morality: when rules are obeyed to avoid punishment and gain rewards, associated with less mature and childlike reasoning - criminals do not progress from this level as they can get it away with it or receive rewards like money
  2. Conventional morality and post-conventional morality: individuals tend to sympathise with others' rights more and exhibit more conventional behaviours such as honesty, generosity, and non-violence
• What is one strength of Kohlberg's levels of moral reasoning?

  • Research support: Palmer and Hollin (1998) compared moral reasoning in 332 non-offenders and 126 convicted offenders using a measure that contains 11 moral-dilemma related questions - offender group showed less mature moral reasoning, consistent w/ Kohlberg's predictions
  • Chandler (1973): offenders are more egocentric and display poorer social perspective-taking skills than non-offenders
• What is one limitation of Kohlberg's level of moral reasoning?

  • Type of offence: level of moral reasoning may depend on the nature of the offence
  • Thornton and Reid (1982) found that those who committed crimes for financial gain (robbery) are more likely to show pre-conventional moral reasoning than those who committed impulsive crimes (assault) as they believe they can evade punishment
  • Shows the theory may not apply to all forms of crime
• What is another limitation of Kohlberg's levels of moral reasoning?

  • Methodological issues: Langdon et al (2010) showed that Kohlberg's theories and research are correlational rather than cause-and-effect, as it may not be people's morals that cause crime but their lack of intelligence
  • Gibbs argued research was culturally biased towards Western culture and didn't represent different moral goals/standards in different countries