Children

1
Childrens Early Moral Development An Analysis
of Moral Language in Childrens Talk

• MS Thesis Research
• Jennifer Cole Wright
• University of Wyoming
• Department of Psychology
• Spring, 2004

2
Research Questions

• When do children begin to engage in moral
  discussion with others?
• How do children use moral language in these
  discussions? What kinds of things do they refer
  to?
• Do we see change in childrens use of moral
  language over time?

3
Review of Moral Development Theories

• Moral knowledge Innate, Learned/Adopted, or
  Discovered/Constructed
• Moral development Early Sensitivity
  (Intuitionist/Sentimentalist) or Late
  Development (Rationalist)
• Moral engagement Passive, Active, or Both
• Moral motivation Internally Generated or
  Externally Generated
• Moral salience Well-being/Feelings, Social
  Norms, or Rules/Principles
• Moral concepts Context-Specific or
  Context-General

4
Participants

• CHILDES (Child Language Data Exchange System,
  MacWhinney Snow, 1990) on-line language
  database
• Archived transcripts of at home adult/child
  conversations
• Transcripts used for
• Abe (age 24.24 50.11), 1st born, caucasian
  male, grad school family, MLU at 33-36 mo 6.0
  45-48 mo 8.0
• Sarah (age 23.19-51.6), 1ST born, caucasian
  female, working class family, MLU at 33-36 mo
  2.3 45-48 mo 3.2

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Target Words

• The use of 99 words were analyzed across seven
  children. 33 were chosen as target words
• Evaluative good, bad, right, wrong, nice, mean,
  kind, poor, friend
• Deontic must, should, better, suppose, trouble
• Emotion/Internal State angry, sorry, worry, sad,
  hope, happy, afraid, love, hate
• Verb/Action hit, need, help, hurt, cry, give,
  kiss
• Virtue brave, strong, gentle

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Coding Scheme

• Used by mother, father, other adult, child
• Use form declarative, interrogative, directive,
  narrative
• Speaker order initiator (of discussion),
  responder
• Adult/Child use to instruct/model (Y/N)
• to approve/disapprove (Y/N)
• to give/ask for reasons/explain (Y/N)
• to motivate obedience (Y/N)
• to communicate feelings (Y/N)
• to motivate perspective-taking (Y/N)
• to elicit sympathy (Y/N)

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Coding Scheme

• Child role passive, active- creative, active-
  reasoning
• Reference to feelings - of speaker or another
  (Y/N)
• welfare/needs - of speaker or another (Y/N)
• disposition/behavior - of speaker or
  another (Y/N)
• damage to goods/property (Y/N)
• principles (e.g. fairness/justice/kindness)
  (Y/N)
• (dis)approval - of speaker or another (Y/N)
• laws/rules or standards/expectations (Y/N)
• obedience/punishment (Y/N)
• Motivation none, internal, external
• Context context-specific, context-general

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Results

• Of 11,061 target words there were 1,155 uses in a
  moral context (10.4)
• Abe 188 (44.7) of 421 uses
• Sarah 219 (29.8) of 734 uses
• Significant negative trend in use over time

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• The same pattern was found with the adults

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Target Words Used in Moral Context
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Categories Used in Moral Context
12
Use Children and Adult
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Developmental TrendsGive/Ask Reasons - Child
Motivate/Deny Obedience - Adult
14
Reference - Children
15
Reference - Adults
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Reference to Motivation - Children

• Abe 88 internal/12 external, Sarah 54
  internal/32 external
• Internal
  External

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Context of Use - Children

• Abe 71 specific/16 general, Sarah 49
  specific/12 general
• Context-Specific Context-General

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Child Role
19

• Passive Active-Creative
  Active- Reasoning

20
Review of Moral Development Theories

• Moral knowledge Innate, Learned/Adopted, or
  Discovered/Constructed
• Moral development Early Sensitivity
  (Intuitionist/Sentimentalist) or Late
  Development (Rationalist)
• Moral engagement Passive, Active, or Both (more
  Active than Passive)
• Moral motivation Internally Generated or
  Externally Generated
• Moral salience Well-being/Feelings, Social
  Norms, or Rules/Principles
• Moral concepts Context-Specific or
  Context-General

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Conclusion

• The picture that emerges is of the young child as
  someone who is both active in his discussion of
  moral issues with the adults in his environment
  and sensitive to the kinds of considerations that
  seem crucial to the development of genuine moral
  understanding.
• Accordingly, the Kohlbergian cognitive-development
  approach seriously underestimates the moral
  capacities of young children. While reasoning
  abilities may play an important role in later
  moral development, it seems clear that they build
  upon a robust moral sensitivity that is already
  present in the child.

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Examples - Abe

• (210.20) it did hurt me then. it doesn't hurt
  me now. it doesn't hurt you now too.
• (210.20) no because Im a mean boy Im gon (t)a
  get you (be)cause you are a mean mommy.
• (310.15) because hes nice to nice people.
• (310.18) yeah Im going to cooperate unless my
  teachers mean to me than I wont cooperate.
• (311.2) you could you could have put it on the
  floor for me. I asked you so you should have done
  it.
• (40.25) if the animals want to be loose the
  zookeepers let em be loose. arent the zookeepers
  nice to the animals?
• (42.19) yeah friends could be still friends if
  theyre mad.
• (48.27) she doesnt like Pudgy a bit. I dont
  because he is so mean.
• (411.21) I know Im gon (t)a be good because
  Im gon (t)a.

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Examples - Sarah

• (27.12) a a mouse bite me. I hit him.
• (29.29) little girl spilled dat milk. girl bad
  too huh?
• (32.16) he's a ba(d) bear (a)n(d) tha(t) means.
  I put you in the crib.
• (32.23) my cousin hit me. an(d) she a bad girl
• (38.6) I wa(s)nt good. I was going to fight.
• (38.25) I should hit her with a pencil (a)n(d)
  a stick.
• (42.1) I hope I dont hurt it (a tree)
• (42.9) I didnt spill it last night uhhuh
  Mommy? because Im a good girl last night.
• (42.16) I did somethin(g) wrong in the dog
  house
• (46.5) dont hit a girl with eye glasses.
• (410.6) when I get to have a broken toy Im
  gonna give that to him. Im gonna give him a
  broken arm.
• (410.27) beat up my pony. xxx so bad. you know
  hes beatin(g) up the pony. engaging in pretend
  play