Examined preschool children's conceptions of moral and conventional rules. Children judged the seriousness, rule contingency, rule relativism, and amount of deserved punishment for 10 depicted moral and conventional preschool transgressions. Constant across ages and sexes, children evaluated moral transgressions as more serious offenses and more…

Summarizes positions in favor of and opposed to euthanasia. Presents suggestions for discussing euthanasia in high school biology classes. (MA)

An experience in values clarification about euthanasia is described. (PBS)

Erik Erikson has described eight stages of the healthy personality. This essay offers a revised version of the eight stages. Although most individuals develop through the eight stages, each is personally unique because patterns of fluctuation between safety and growth differ from one individual to another. (Author)

This study evaluated the effectiveness, in the natural classroom environment, of brief moral training programs using an indirect approach, where correct responses are not directly identified and reinforced. Two areas of moral thinking were tested: children's reasons for doing good and delay of gratification. The training proved effective.…

Reports an attempt to test two interpretations of immanent justice responses as causal attributions rather than as moral judgments. Finds older children use causal chains to explain contiguity between misdeed and adversity. Data were interpreted as consistent with an information-processing model of immanent justice responses. (RMH)

Teaching for values instead of knowledge would significantly change education. Could the psychosocial values of goodness, beauty, search for truth, social organization, and economics be rank ordered? Can and how should such life-survival values as health, sex, aggression and self-defense, language, and love be taught in school? (Author/SB)

Reports on a study conducted to investigate Kohlberg's allegation that his test discerns between form and content in moral development. Indicates that the aspect of form which he measures is probably general intellectual development that rePresents norms that the school intentionally transmits to pupils. (JD)

Those who preferred principled levels of moral reasoning were seen as being dependable, rational, creative, intelligent, and accepting of rules and constraints of society, but at the same time, able to think independently and aware of the need for change. (Author)

Male and female college students in several countries assessed various forms of social behavior in this study of cross-cultural agreement in moral judgments. (MP)

Discusses the goals of moral education in terms of helping students to do more than tell the difference between good and bad and to make sound judgments. Moral educators should primarily be concerned with strengthening the wills of their students. (Author/KC)

College students were tested on Hogan's Survey of Ethical Attitudes, Rest's Defining Issues Test, Collins' revision of Rotter's Internal-External Scale, and Snyder's Self-Monitoring Scale. Subjects who endorsed personal conscience showed greater maturity in moral reasoning. The subjects who advocated social responsibility tended to show more…

Defining "sophomoritis" as a problematic phase in the transition from conventional to principled moral judgment, the author describes an experimental course, Psychology 448, designed around this problem. The course sought to integrate introductory ethics materials with Kolhberg's moral development theory. Effects of the course on…

Examining research inspired by Kohlberg's moral development theory, the authors highlight some conceptual and methodological weaknesses and present the practical and theoretical limitations of implementing Kohlberg's ideas in the classroom. (SK)

Based on the author's educational experiences as a student and teacher at Jesuit high schools and developed within the framework of the cognitive development theories of Lawrence Kohlberg, describes six stages of moral development. Concludes with a description of teachers at six stages of professional development. (AYC)