Looking Back and Moving Forward: Historical Lessons for Current Research on Moral Development

A history of research on the development of morality yields valuable lessons. In 1932, Piaget examined children's moral judgments, proposing that actions feedback on judgments, which in turn feedback on actions. He analyzed children's entry into the moral realm through a sense of obligation. Subsequently, Kohlberg proposed a sequence entailing differentiations of justice from non-moral considerations, emphasizing epistemology, and how one level of development is more adequate than prior levels. The Piaget and Kohlberg differentiation models of development have not held up to subsequent evidence; young children distinguish morality from social conventions as well as from the domain of personal jurisdiction. History points to issues requiring further analyses. These include expositions of children's entry into the moral domain; developmental transformations and the bases for greater adequacy; interrelations between judgments and actions; and connections between judgments and emotions, including study of on-going, background dispositions labeled sentiments.