Moral and social reasoning and perspective taking in later life: A longitudinal study.

Abstract

In this study 27 older adults (ages 64-80) and 23 middle-aged adults (ages 35-54) were tested for moral stage, integrative complexity of social reasoning, and perspective-taking levels twice over a 4-year period. Moral reasoning stage levels did not change over time for either age group. Older adults, but not the middle-aged, showed a significant decline over time in level of moral perspective taking. Complexity of reasoning about several interpersonal social issues declined modestly in both age groups. More social-cognitive support, a higher education level, and better self-reported health were all found to be protective factors in forestalling declines in mature adults' sociocognitive reasoning, consistent with other research on cognitive measures in later life.Do time and experience systematically alter the ways in which mature adults come to think about their social and moral lives? This question has been addressed by several means in psychological research to date. Lawrence Kohlberg's (e.g., 1976) six-stage description of moral reasoning is a prototypic example of the developmental approach to social cognition. According to this framework, individuals progress gradually from a primitive, egocentric morality to a more principled, universal view, the highest levels of which even many mature adults are believed not to achieve. The sequence of these stage progressions from childhood through middle adulthood has been documented through both cross-sectional and longitudinal investigations (e.g., Colby &Kohlberg, 1987;Walker, 1989). Research on the development of these stages of reasoning in later life is sparse and entirely cross-sectional, but it generally suggests that mature adults differ little on average from midlife to at least age 75 (e.g.

Judgement of Blame in Alzheimer's Disease Sufferers

“…According to Surber (1977) the algebraic structure of the blame schema obeys an averaging rule, which is observed whatever the age of the participants. Surber's result is congruent with more recent studies that show no significant difference between young and elderly adults reasoning on Kohlberg's moral dilemmas (Pratt et al, 1996;White, 1988). These studies have shown that stage levels do not change over time with middle age adults and older adults.…”

“…Many studies of Kolberg's cognitive developmental stages using Kohlberg's moral dilemmas failed to show a significant effect of age on moral stage with adults (Pratt, Diessner, Hunsberger, Pancer, & Savoy, 1991;Pratt, Diessner, Pratt, Hunsberger, & Pancer, 1996;White, 1988). In addition, Pratt et al (1996) have shown that with adults, moral reasoning stages do not change over a four year time period whatever the age of the adults, but moral perspective-taking ability does decline over time for older adults. It has also been shown, using Kohlberg's dilemmas (Levine, 1976), that even though the level of moral reasoning does not change during adulthood, the measured level of moral reasoning changes according to the empathy level the reasoner has with the actors in the dilemma.…”

“…Indeed, Pratt et al (1996) observed that with normal elderly people there was a significant decline in their level of perspective-taking ability in moral judgements.…”

“…Indeed, to judge the level of seriousness of a situation for a victim, people have to consider the victim's point of view and cannot just use the violation detection strategy. Studying the blame level as a function of the seriousness of the consequence should allow us to see if the AD people are deficient in their perspective-taking ability, as suggested by Pratt et al (1996), or if they are still able to consider another person's point of view in their judgement of blame. Thus, this study should allow us to answer the following questions: (1) are the AD patients still able to use deontic reasoning as well as normal elderly people and to be aware of what is allowed and what is forbidden in our social life when they have to blame an actor?…”

A Mind-Reader Does Not Always Have Deontological Moral Judgments and Prosocial Behavior: A Developmental Perspective

“…According to the cognitive-developmental theory, moral judgments mature with age, and the final postconventional level is reached in early adulthood (Colby and Kohlberg, 1987). When entering into late adulthood, individuals' moral perspective taking declines over time (Pratt et al, 1996). Moreover, the present study found that the younger adults made deontological moral judgments to a greater extent than other age groups, who were inclined to make more utilitarian moral judgments.…”