2-107 - The Development of Moral Concepts: From Acquisition to Application

Session Type: Paper Symposium

Integrative Statement

The development of moral considerations about others’ welfare, fairness, and rights involves both the acquisition of fundamental moral concepts and the application of such concepts to multifaceted situations. While very young children grapple with an act of unprovoked hitting or stealing in a narrowly defined context, older children and adults make judgments that take into account non-moral concepts such as intergroup categories and psychological intentionality, revealing complex decision-making processes.

The proposed symposium adopts this developmental perspective by bringing together research on young children’s concepts of harm and others’ welfare and research on older children’s applications of these moral concepts to multifaceted situations. The first talk will present research on 2- and 4-year-olds’ distinctions between moral and conventional violations using a novel behavioral paradigm. The second talk will present interview and observational data regarding preschoolers’ orientations toward the use of physical force toward others in everyday life. The third talk will discuss research on how 5- to 10-year-olds use information about group membership when making moral judgments. The final presentation will discuss developmental differences from 3 to 13 years of age in how children incorporate information about the recipients’ needs and mental state knowledge when making resource allocation decisions.

The symposium will point to new directions for connecting research on the acquisition of fundamental moral concepts to the application of such concepts to everyday situations that individuals encounter. The general discussion will integrate the current findings on moral judgment, taking into account the coexisting development of intergroup categories and psychological intentionality.

Sub Unit

• Moral Development

Chair

• Audun Dahl, University of California, Santa Cruz

Individual Presentations

• Young Children Distinguish Moral and Conventional Transgressions: Comparisons of Moral Preferences and Judgments - Presenting Author: Judith G Smetana, University of Rochester; Courtney L. Ball, University of Rochester; Marc Jambon, University of Rochester

• Preschoolers’ Orientations toward Everyday Acts of Interpersonal Force - Presenting Author: Audun Dahl, University of California, Santa Cruz; Gabriella F. Freda, University of California, Santa Cruz; Elliot Turiel, University of California, Berkeley

• Does Essentialization of Social Categories Affect Children’s Moral Judgments? - Presenting Author: Telli Davoodi, Boston University; Gaye Soley, Bogazici University; Paul Lansley Harris, Harvard Graduate School of Education; Peter R Blake, Boston University

• Fairness, Equality, and Intentionality: The Complexity of Resource Allocation Decisions - Presenting Author: Melanie Killen, University of Maryland, College Park; Michael T Rizzo, University of Maryland; Leon Li, University of Maryland, College Park; Amanda R. Burkholder, University of Maryland