Kohlberg’s Theory of Moral Development

Kohlberg’s theory of moral development is a stage-based model of moral maturity developed by Lawrence Kohlberg in 1958. The theory offers three levels of moral development, each of which contains two stages. Kohlberg asserts that moral development is neither the result of a genetic blueprint nor the result of conscious teaching of morality. Rather, it is a process of maturing that arises from thinking about moral issues.

Kohlberg’s theory specifies six stages of moral development, arranged in three levels.

Level I: Preconventional/Premoral

Level one is preconventional morality, wherein a person is motivated by obedience to authority. This level of moral development is commonly associated with young children and involves little thought about morality.

Stage 1: Obedience and punishment orientation

• Morality is motivated solely by punishment and anything which is punishable is deemed wrong.

Stage 2: Instrumental relativist orientation

• Right action is that which is instrumental in satisfying the self’s needs and occasionally others’.
• Focuses on individualism and different perspectives, and the goal is to avoid punishment.

Level II: Conventional/Role Conformity

Moral values reside in performing the right role, in maintaining the conventional order and expectancies of others as a value in its own right.

Stage 3: Good-boy/good-girl orientation

• Orientation to approval, to pleasing and helping others.
• Conformity to stereotypical images of majority or natural role behavior.
• Action is evaluated in terms of intentions.

Stage 4: Authority and social-order-maintaining orientation

• Orientation to “doing duty” and to showing respect for authority and maintaining the given social order or its own sake.
• Regard for earned expectations of others.
• Differentiates actions out of a sense of obligation to rules from actions for generally “nice” or natural motives.

Level III: Postconventional/Self-Accepted Moral Principles

Morality is defined in terms of conformity to shared standards,rights, or duties apart from supporting authority. The standards conformed to are internal, and action-decisions are based on an inner process of thought and judgement concerning right and wrong.

Stage 5: Contractual/legalistic orientation

• Norms of right and wrong are defined in terms of laws or institutionalized rules which seem to have a rational basis.
• When conflict arises between individual needs and law or contract, though sympathetic to the former, the individual believes the latter must prevail because of its greater functional rationality for society, the majority will and welfare.

Stage 6: The morality of individual principles of conscience

• Orientation not only toward existing social rules, but also toward the conscience as a directing agent, mutual trust and respect, and principles of moral choice involving logical universalities and consistency.
• Action is controlled by internalized ideals that exert a pressure to act accordingly regardless of the reactions of others in the immediate environment.
• If one acts otherwise, self-condemnation and guilt result.

Almost every CTET and State TET ( UPTET, HTET etc) question paper has questions from this topic. Refer

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