Life Span Development II School Age and Adolescence

Life Span Development II: School age and Adolescence 3 (2+1)

Lesson 6 : Moral development during late childhood

Pre-conventional level

At the first broad level of moral development is the pre-conventional level, where morality is based on the external forces. Children confined to rules to avoid punishment or to obtain personal rewards and their reasoning reflects a belief that goodness or badness is determined by consequences. Moral values reside in external happenings in bad acts rather than in persons and standards.

Stage – I Punishment and Obedience orientation.
Stage – II Instrumental –Purpose Orientation

Stage-I : During the I stage of this level, the child views adults as all powerful and all knowing authority and submits unquestioningly to them. This is seen in children who are below 10 years. Obedience is valued for its own sake and the motivation for acting morally is to avoid punishment. Children have difficulty in considering others point of view. Actions are evaluated in terms of their physical consequences such as the amount of damage done.

Stage- II: It appears at age 10, children believe that rules should be followed when it is in one’s best interest to do so. Morality is based on one’s own needs or interests. Goodness and badness refer to what does / doesn’t satisfy one’s needs.

Characteristics of pre-conventional level

• Child defines wrong as those things that he gets punished for; right as obeying the commands of authorities – parents and teachers.
• When the moral judgment is fully developed, the child defines right as whatever works out to their advantage.
• The criteria the child uses to judge right and wrong is determined by self interest, and the reasoning is concrete.
• Rules are unchangeable commands from higher authority.
• The understanding of the rules is so limited that the application of them is very inconsistent.
• The child applies special rules to special situations.
• Right is what good people do and wrong is what bad people do.