Social Cognition & Morality

Question 1

Thinking about the thoughts, feelings, motives, and behavior of the self and other people.

Answer 1

social cognition

Question 2

A research paradigm used to assess an important aspect of a theory of mind, mainly the understanding that people can hold incorrect beliefs and be influenced by them.

Answer 2

false belief task

Question 3

The understanding that people have mental states (feelings, desires, beliefs, intentions) and that these states underlie and help explain their behavior.

Answer 3

theory of mind

Question 4

The earliest theory of mind: an understanding that desires guide behavior (for example, that people seek things they like and avoid things they hate).

Answer 4

desire psychology

Question 5

The theory of mind reflecting an understanding that people’s desires and beliefs guide their behavior and that their beliefs are not always an accurate reflection of reality; evident by age 4.

Answer 5

belief–desire psychology

Question 6

Neural cells in several brain areas that are activated when we perform an action or observe someone else performing it.

Answer 6

mirror neurons

Question 7

The ability to assume other people’s perspectives and understand their thoughts, feelings, and behaviors; role-taking skills.

Answer 7

social perspective-taking skills

Question 8

The ability to distinguish right from wrong, to act on this distinction, and to experience pride when doing something right and to experience guilt or shame when doing something wrong.

Answer 8

morality; has affective, cognitive, and behavioral components.

Question 9

The emotional component of morality, including feelings of guilt, shame, and pride regarding one’s conduct.

Answer 9

moral affect

Question 10

The cognitive component of morality; the thinking that occurs when people decide whether acts are right or wrong.

Answer 10

moral reasoning

Question 11

According to Bandura, the ability to avoid self condem nation when engaged in immoral behavior by justifying, minimizing, or blaming others for one’s actions.

Answer 11

moral disengagement

Question 12

Standards of conduct that focus on the basic rights and privileges of individuals.

Answer 12

moral rules

Question 13

Gilligan’s term for what she says is the dominant moral orientation of females, in which the individual emphasizes concern and responsibility for the welfare of other people rather than abstract rights.

Answer 13

morality of care

Question 14

Gilligan’s term for what she says is the dominant moral orientation of males, in which moral dilemmas are viewed as inevitable conflicts between the rights of two or more parties that must be settled by law.

Answer 14

morality of justice

Question 15

The vicarious experiencing of another person’s feelings.

Answer 15

empathy

Question 16

Positive actions toward other people such as helping and cooperating.

Answer 16

prosocial behavior

Question 17

The mutual give and take by both parties in a human relationship that forms an important basis for morality.

Answer 17

reciprocity

Question 18

According to Piaget, a period during the preschool years when children show little awareness or understanding of rules and cannot be considered to be moral beings.

Answer 18

premoral period

Question 19

A term meaning subject to authority and referring to the childhood beliefs that rules are handed down by authority figures and are sacred and unalterable and that wrongness should be judged on the basis of
consequences rather than intentions; typical of
children ages 6 to 10, according to Piaget.

Answer 19

heteronomous morality

Question 20

The most mature Piagetian stage of morality in which rules are viewed as agreements between individuals that can be changed through a consensus of those individuals and in which the older child or adolescent pays more attention to intentions than to consequences in judging actions.

Answer 20

autonomous morality

Question 21

Kohlberg’s term for the first two stages of moral reasoning, in which society’s rules are not yet internalized and judgments are based on the punishing or rewarding consequences of an act.

Answer 21

preconventional morality

Question 22

Kohlberg’s term for the third and fourth stages of moral reasoning in which societal values are internalized and judgments are based on a desire to gain approval or uphold law and social order.

Answer 22

conventional morality

Question 23

Kohlberg’s term for the fifth and sixth stages of moral reasoning, in which moral judgments are based on a more abstract understanding of democratic social contracts or on universal principles of justice that have validity apart from the views of particular authority figures.

Answer 23

postconventional morality

Question 24

Lacking any sense of morality; without standards of right and wrong.

Answer 24

amoral

Question 25

A close, affectively positive, and cooperative relationship in which child and parent are attached to each other and are sensitive to each other’s needs; a contributor to moral development.

Answer 25

mutually responsive orientation

Question 26

Standards of conduct determined by social consensus that indicate what is appropriate within a particular social setting.

Answer 26

social-conventional rules

Question 27

A form of discipline that involves withholding attention, affection, or approval after a child misbehaves.

Answer 27

love withdrawal

Question 28

A form of discipline that involves the use of superior power to administer spankings, withhold privileges, and so on.

Answer 28

power assertion

Question 29

A form of discipline that involves explaining why a child’s behavior is wrong and should be changed by emphasizing its effects on other people.

Answer 29

induction

Question 30

Law-breaking by a minor.

Answer 30

juvenile delinquency

Question 31

A persistent pattern of behavior in which a child or adolescent violates the rights of others or age-appropriate societal norms, as through fighting, bullying, and cruelty.

Answer 31

conduct disorder

Question 32

A home in which family members are locked in power struggles, each trying to control the other through aggressive tactics such as threatening, yelling, and hitting.

Answer 32

coercive family environment

Question 33

Repeatedly inflicting harm through words or actions on weaker peers who cannot or do not defend themselves.

Answer 33

bullying

Question 34

The view that both deliberate thought and more automatic emotion-based intuitions can inform decisions about moral issues and motivate behavior.

Answer 34

dual process model of morality

Question 35

A search for ultimate meaning in life that may or may not be carried out in the context of religion.

Answer 35

spirituality