Poster #130 - Relations Between Adolescents’ Domain-Based Moral Reasoning and Action Choices

• In Event: 2-055 - Poster Session 06
  In Poster Session: PS 06 Section - Moral Development

Integrative Statement

Why do people’s moral judgments often fail to predict their actions? This “judgment-action gap” (Blasi, 1980) is a perennial question in the field of moral development. One prevalent example is bullying: though the vast majority of young people judge bullying as wrong (Gini et al., 2008; Thornberg et al., 2014), meta-analyses show that about 35% of adolescents report having perpetrated bullying behavior (Modecki et al., 2014), and even more have acted as bystanders (Trach et al., 2010).

Although judgments of right and wrong may not always correspond well to social decisions, examining the reasoning behind a given judgment may provide insight. Social cognitive domain theory (SCDT) provides a framework for analyzing such reasoning, based on evidence that people distinguish between different domains of social knowledge - namely, morality, social convention, and matters of personal choice and safety (see Table 1) - when reasoning about social situations (Smetana, 1999). Though research has shown that children and adults consider moral principles more universal and serious than other rules (Smetana et al., 2012), morality is not the only factor in deciding whether and how to act; SCDT posits that considerations from all the domains are coordinated and weighed in different ways depending on personal and contextual factors (Turiel, 2015). Theoretically, this variance can lead to different action decisions even when moral judgments are similar. However, little research has directly investigated the relationship between domain prioritization and action choices, especially among youth.

In this study, using data from the National Professional Development and Evaluation Project, adolescents (N=574; 57% female; 43% grade 9, 57% grade 10) from 34 high schools across the United States were asked to reason about a morally-relevant situation. After reading a vignette describing an episode of identity-based bullying, participants rated (from 1=“very bad” to 4=“very good”): (Q1) potential reasons for intervention, including both moral and conventional reasoning justifications; and (Q2) choices for how they would respond if they witnessed the situation themselves, including options to intervene directly, intervene indirectly, bystand, or join in.

Multilevel regression modeling (students nested in schools) was used to determine if ratings of moral vs. conventional reasoning (Q1) predicted endorsement of each action choice (Q2). Based on previous findings, participants’ gender and perceived prevalence of bullying at school were included as control variables. Results (see Table 2) indicate that the choice to directly intervene was predicted by high ratings of moral reasoning. Endorsement of indirect intervention, on the other hand, was marginally positively predicted by ratings of conventional reasoning and negatively predicted by ratings of moral reasoning. Reasoning ratings did not relate to endorsement of bystanding or joining in, but males were more likely to endorse both of these choices (and less likely to endorse direct intervention), while students who perceived greater bullying prevalence were more likely to say they would bystand.

Findings will be discussed in terms of adolescents’ development of moral agency and understanding of social conventions in school settings, as well as implications for youth bullying prevention and bystander intervention efforts.

Author

• Emily J. Campbell, UC Berkeley Graduate School of Education
  Presenting Author