Kohlberg's Theory of Moral Reasoning
Theory featuring six stages of moral development advanced by American psychologist Lawrence Kohlberg.
Lawrence Kohlberg (1927-1987), an American psychologist, pioneered the study of moral development in the late 1950s. Kohlberg's theory of moral reasoning involved six stages through which each person passes in order, without skipping a stage or reversing their order. His theory states that not all people progress through all six stages.
In the 1950s, science as a whole held to the positivist belief that scientific study should be free of moral values, maintaining instead a purely "objective," value-free stance. Western psychology at that time was dominatedby behaviorists who focused on behavior rather than reasoning or will. In 1958, Lawrence Kohlberg published a study that broke with both the positivists and behaviorists by presenting a theory of moral development (bringing together science and moral values) based on cognitive reasoning (rather than behavior). Kohlberg's theory initiated an entirely new field of study in Western science that gained momentum in the 1960s and 1970s and continues to inspire new research today.
Kohlberg's theory of moral development expands upon Jean Piaget's work in the 1930s concerning cognitive reasoning. Piaget proposed three phases of cognitive development through which people pass in a loose order.
This is a free page. This page contains 201 words. This
article contains 1,523 words (approx. 5 pages at 300
words per page).
Read the rest of this Article with our Kohlberg's Theory of Moral Reasoning Access Pass.
