Kohlberg levels of moral reasoning- FORENSICS

Question 1

AO1- what are Kohlberg’s levels of moral reasoning?

Answer 1

• development of moral reasoning is a stage process where someone matures and in turn so does their moral reasoning.
• Kohlberg believed that some people don’t progress past certain levels, making them more likely to commit a crime
• argument is that an offender who’s at a lower stage of moral development will be more likely to commit a crime as they’re thinking about how it affects THEM and not SOCIETY.

Question 2

PRE-CONVENTIONAL MORALITY

• what age does this occur?
• what are the 2 stages within this level?

Answer 2

• age 6 to 13 years

1= OBEDIENCE AND PUNISHMENT ORIENTATION
- moral judgement motivated by need to avoid punishment, if punishment isn’t definite then a crime is more likely to occur

2= INSTRUMENTAL-RELATIVIST ORIENTATION
- moral judgement motivated by need to satisfy own desires
- if potential gains are good, then crime is more likely to occur

Question 3

CONVENTIONAL MORALITY

• what age does this occur?
• what are the 2 levels?

Answer 3

• 13 to 16 years

3= GOODBOY/NICEGIRL ORIENTATION
- moral orientation motivated by need to avoid rejection or disapproval from others
- what would other people think?—> if the closest people are criminals then crime is more likely to occur

4=LAW AND ORDER ORIENTATION
- moral judgement motivated by need to not be criticised by an authority figure
- obedience to the law
- at this stage someone is less likely to commit a crime.

Question 4

POST-CONVENTIONAL MORALITY

• what are the 2 stages?

Answer 4

5= LEGALISTIC ORIENTATION
- moral judgement motivated by community respect for all, respecting social order and living under legally determined laws
- someone at this stage adheres to the law but may commit a crime under certain circumstances where they feel the law shouldn’t apply

6= UNIVERSAL, ETHICAL ORIENTATION
- moral judgement determined by one’s own conscience
- individual has their own moral code
- may commit a crime if they feel the law is unjust.

Question 5

Research by Hollin into Kohlberg’s theory claimed that…

Answer 5

• offenders are in a less mature stage of moral development than non-offenders

Question 6

Research by Palmer into Kohlberg’s theory claimed that…

Answer 6

• looked at association between moral development and offending behaviour
• suggested that it’s specific moral values that’s associated with offending and it’s a relationship between the 2.

implication= intervention programmes should include training to increase offenders’ level of moral reasoning

• this research has PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS

Question 7

Research by Ashkar and Kenny into Kohlberg’s theory showed that…

Answer 7

• compared the moral reasoning level of juvenile sex and non-sex offenders to see where there was differences in maturity of reasoning
• when asked about their reasoning in contacts similar to their crimes, both showed a level of pre-conventional moral reasoning

BUT..

• they showed higher levels of moral reasoning in contact unrelated to their crime

therefore suggests that

1= moral reasoning varies by context

2= offenders have lower levels if moral reasoning which is specific to offending type

Question 8

AO3- Kohlberg

Answer 8

LIMITATIONS:

• theory was developed using a dilemma scenario, so it’s low in predictive validity (the way in which a ppt responds to a questionnaire would probs differ to what they’d do in reality)
• theory developed using data from boys only, so suffers from gender bias—> given the varying rates of crime between men and women, may be that moral development in genders is different, but Kohlberg doesn’t take this into account

STRENGTHS:

• Research by Walker showed moral development over time, which can account for incidence of anti-social behaviour in younger adults
• moral reasoning can account for the individual differences in offending. behaviour, as it can explain why one person would commit a crime but someone else wouldn’t.