Moral, conventional, and personal rules: The perspective of foster youth

Mullins, David F.; Tisak, Marie S.

doi:10.1016/j.appdev.2006.04.003

Cited by 3 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 55 publications

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“…This requirement to strictly follow all rules may have socialized these participants to show an overly rule-oriented response pattern. These findings are consistent with previous research on individuals with anti-social behaviours (Blair, 1995(Blair, , 1997Tisak & Jankowski, 1996) as well as children in foster care, who use conventional reasoning even when evaluating moral and personal violations (Mullins & Tisak, 2006). Furthermore, these findings are also in line with deterrence theory, suggesting that people frequently obey rules because they think they might get caught and punished for violating the rule (Nagin, 1998;Paternoster, 2010;Piquero, Paternoster, Pogarsky, & Loughran, 2011).…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

Cognitive processing of moral and social judgements: A comparison of offenders, students, and control participants

Lahat

Gummerum

Mackay

et al. 2015

Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology

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Examining cognitive processes related to offenders' moral and social judgements is important in order to better understand their criminal behaviour. In the present study, 30 offenders, 30 students, and 24 control participants were administered the moral-conventional judgements computer task, which requires responding under strict time constraints. Participants read scenarios and were asked to judge whether the act was acceptable or unacceptable when rules were either assumed or removed. Additionally, participants completed an executive function (EF) task in order to examine the relation between EF and moral and social judgements. The findings revealed that, as expected, controls and students had faster reaction times (RTs) and a higher percentage of normative judgements than offenders. Additionally, offenders had a low percentage of normative judgements, particularly in the conventional rule removed condition. Finally, RTs of moral and conventional judgements in most conditions were related to EF among students but not controls or offenders. We conclude that offenders, as compared to controls and students, may rely more on rule-oriented responding and may rely less on EF when making moral and social judgements.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

Cognitive processing of moral and social judgements: A comparison of offenders, students, and control participants

Lahat

Gummerum

Mackay

et al. 2015

Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology

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show abstract

“…Finally, our analyses did not indicate any publication bias. As our analyses included numerous studies with children of diverse ages and compared moral and conventional distinctions across different ages rather than merely examining whether participants differentiated morality from conventions (e.g., Buchanan-Barrow & Barrett, 1998; Mullins & Tisak, 2006; Smetana & Braeges, 1990; Song et al, 1987), this meta-analysis may have included studies with null or weak distinction effects. Nevertheless, as we only found and included a handful of unpublished studies and the “file drawer” problem may influence the overall effect sizes, the results should be interpreted with caution.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The role of gender has not been of central interest in this body of research, although studies have often tested for gender effects. Most studies have not found variations in moral/conventional distinctions in judgments according to child gender (e.g., Buchanan-Barrow & Barrett, 1998; Crane & Tisak, 1995; Smetana, Rote, et al, 2012), but when differences have been found, the direction of the effects (whether males make greater distinctions than females or vice versa) has been inconsistent (e.g., Caravita et al, 2017; Mullins & Tisak, 2006). Therefore, gender effects need to be tested more systematically.…”

Section: Morality As Distinct From Conventionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The different characteristics of types of moral harm seem to influence children’s evaluations of moral transgressions overall. Studies have found that physical harm is viewed as a more serious transgression than psychological harm or unfairness across early and middle childhood (e.g., Ball, Smetana, & Sturge-Apple, 2017; Murray-Close et al, 2006; Tisak & Turiel, 1988), although this can vary depending on children’s specific social experiences (e.g., Mullins & Tisak, 2006). Therefore, these findings indicate that children’s understanding of different types of moral rules may affect whether they distinguish them from conventions.…”

Section: Morality As Distinct From Conventionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Distinctions between moral and conventional judgments from early to middle childhood: A meta-analysis of social domain theory research.

Yoo¹,

Smetana²

2022

Developmental Psychology

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Understanding distinctions between morality and conventions is an important milestone in children’s moral development. The current meta-analysis integrated decades of social domain theory research (Smetana, 2006; Turiel, 1983) on moral and conventional judgments from early to middle childhood. We examined 95 effect sizes from 18 studies (2,707 children; Mage = 7.30 years; 51% females; 42% Whites). Along with these, effects from additional 28 studies were estimated with imputed correlations in a secondary analysis of 248 effect sizes from 46 studies (4,469 children; Mage = 7.34 years; 46% females; 32% Whites). Across all judgments, moral/conventional distinction effects were significant, positive, and moderate. Consistent with social domain theory definitions of morality, children evaluated moral transgressions as more wrong independent of authorities’ commands or rules than conventional transgressions and moral rules as more generalizable and inalterable than conventional rules. Moral transgressions also were seen as more unacceptable and more deserving of punishment than conventional transgressions. The aggregated effects were also significant for each type of judgment. However, effects were stronger for criteria considered definitional of the domains than for acceptability or punishment judgments, which are not considered criteria. Moreover, children made greater domain distinctions with age across all types of judgments. When examined separately, age moderated effects only for criterion judgments, not for acceptability or punishment judgments. Effects for distinctions also were moderated by the types of moral and conventional rules assessed. Thus, moral/conventional distinctions were found across early and middle childhood, but there was variability in children’s developing understanding.

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