Kohlberg 's Six Stages Of Moral Development

Lawrence Kohlberg, the author of three stages, was an American psychologist who is well known for his theory on the stages of moral development. According to Kohlberg, there are three levels of moral development:Preconventional (moral reasoning is based on external rewards and punishments), Conventional (laws and rules are upheld simply because they are laws and rules), and Postconventional (reasoning is based on personal moral standards)” (powerpoint).

Ethical leadership is vital for the success of any business; this case study illustrates that the lack of moral values and a healthy ethically incline corporate culture, can lead to scrupulous behavior from the CEO all the way down the company. Scrushy had a demanding and cunning personality, and it was easy for his to influence others in his business to go along with the fraud. Also, having Stanwick and Stanwick, (2013) an active board of directors does have a positive impact on the performance of the firm. Also, good corporate governance supports the ethical requirements established by the stakeholders. A moral leader must cultivate a real ethically driven organization, which has no tolerance for unethical behavior.

Corporations can be large or small but they all have some sort of ethical impact on their employees, shareholders, customers, community, and surrounding environments. Richard DeGeorge writes, “We can speak of corporations having moral responsibilities to act in certain ways, and they are morally responsible for the consequences of their actions on people.” (p. 200). Large corporations are comprised of the board of directors, management, and their workers. They also deal with suppliers, customers, and have competitors. This essay will examine the moral responsibilities within a corporation.

In this case, Russell is in Mr. Willow’s eighth-grade biology class. After scoring a 72 percent on his first test, Russell’s dad threatens to take away his extracurricular activities. Worried that his dad will take away his social life, Russell decides that he is going to work extra hard on his genetics assignment so that he can improve his grade and get back on his dad’s good side. After hearing that Mr. Willow’s genetics assignment is extremely difficult, Russell is persuaded by his soccer teammate, Luis, to use his brother’s assignment that he turned in to Mr. Willow a few years back that had received a high grade. Thinking about pleasing his dad, keeping his social life, and not getting made fun of by his teammate, Russell turns in Luis’ brother’s assignment as his own. Mr. Willow notices that the paper is not Russell’s original work and embarrasses him in front of the entire class. Given Russell’s age and actions, Russell is in the conventional stage of Kohlberg’s Moral Development, more specifically the “Good boy/Good girl” stage because he is looking to meet other people’s expectations when he is making decisions. For example, Russell used Luis’s brother’s assignment because he wanted to get a good grade that would please his dad. Secondly, Russell knew that if Luis found out that he didn’t use his brother’s assignment, Luis would more than likely make fun of him.

Americans are outraged. Billions of taxpayer dollars were committed last year to rescuing firms such as Citigroup and the American International Group (AIG). Earlier this year, several companies who received Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) assistance were awarding top executives with extravagant bonuses. According to the Wall Street Journal, the U.S. government lent $238 billion in TARP taxpayer funds to almost 700 banks; 44 of these banks have repaid a $71 billion (Johnston, para 6). There remains $167 billion invested in banks. Some critics argue that a “mere” $167 billion is not significant to warrant public indignation against bonuses. However, the issue is not about specific bonus amounts but the principle of

Looks like "Wall Street got something right for once," said Tim Mullaney at Market​Watch. Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf abruptly resigned last week, forced into retirement by devastating revelations that employees secretly created some 2 million fraudulent accounts in order to meet unrealistic sales quotas. The banking giant had already fired some 5,000 workers over the scandal, but as it became clear that the malfeasance was rooted deep in Wells' corporate culture, "accountability needed to be had at the top." Finally, a banking executive is taking the fall for his company's misdeeds, said Helaine Olen in Slate. Why is this time different? JPMorgan Chase's Jamie Dimon, for instance, still has his job despite the fact that lax oversight allowed

Augustine 's understanding of the relationship between the sovereignty of God and human responsibility is more biblical than Cassian 's view. Augustine 's school of theology totally relies on God as the grace giver, however Cassian 's school relies on man 's merit before receiving grace. This debate has been going on since the early church and still affects the church today. Many people have different opinions and interpretations of how the Bible deals with predestination and man 's free will. Augustine 's understanding is more biblical due to his ability to use scripture properly, show both sides of the argument, and defend his case with better clarity.

Nevertheless, the core purpose of corporation is profit. While the major problem for acting morally is cost. McGuire et al (1988) suggest that ‘morality leads to additional cost, as corporations should care about local community development and reduce the negative impact to environment’, by doing so corporations tend to be at a disadvantaged in terms of price competition than those corporations who care less about morality issues. Further more, previous business education influences leaders’ choice and behavior as well. Caulkin (2004) argues that ‘in business school, people are taught to use deviant ways to increase share prices and grab higher bonuses and salaries’. Similarly, Knights and O’Leary (2006) suggest that ‘previous business school education concentrates more on shareholder value and might lead to the failure of ethical leadership and even drive leaders to pursue success and wealth without considering morality’. Hence, as time passes, under the subtle influence of business education and leaders’ own selfish, leaders become increasingly care just about profits and return on equity and assets.

Kohlberg’s stages of moral development were based on a moral philosopher by the name of Lawrence Kohlberg. His main interest was to observe children during growth to develop and conclude which stages they best fit into. After observing both adults and children, he concluded that, “Human beings progress consecutively from one stage to the next in an invariant sequence” (“Kohlberg’s Stages of Moral Development”). All of the 6 stages he created, represent the morality in which a child or adult can be at; he created an age zone for each stage. There are a total of 6 stages but each main concept consists of 3 levels. Level 1 is the preconventional stage. This stage focuses on punishment/obedience and how the person decides to act due to the

Thanks you for this opportunity to apply for Position at your school, I understand you have a student centred philosophy, so I’ve done some research on cognitive and moral development in primary age students.

The manner in which we are able to distinguish right from wrong as we get older and mature is referred to as moral development. Moral reasoning or rational judgment making is also a dependent factor of one’s moral development. According to Lawrence Kohlberg, “People move beyond their current stage when they encounter a crisis that their current mode of thinking is unable to satisfactorily resolve” (Boss 92). There are certain characteristics that a morally developed person will have and that a non-developed person will be lacking, which is how they are differentiable from one another. Based on many variables, there is a high possibility for moral development to occur. I will explain my position by discussing all aspects of Kohlberg’s Stage Theory of Moral Development, the different types of defense mechanisms that could prevent a person from moving on, which levels other theories might hold using the stage theory, and the purpose of studying ethics.

Psychologist Lawrence Kohlberg is widely known for his proposed stages of moral development; he argued that the development of moral reasoning “is a continual process that occurs throughout the lifespan.” (Cherry). Moreover, Kohlberg’s stages of moral development involve three levels, namely: the preconventional moral reasoning, conventional moral reasoning and postconventional moral reasoning. Each of these levels consists of two stages. Furthermore, we will examine Kohlberg’s stages of moral development by creating a character named Ciara. Ciara is a mischievous, temperamental and aggressive 11-year old who studies at a christian school. Throughout this essay we will see how Ciara’s moral reasoning will evolve.

The theory of moral development, advanced by psychologist Lawrence Kohlberg is one of the most well-known persuasive theories in the field of cognitive science and stems from the work of Jean Piaget, which hypothesizes on the direct correlation that exists between moral and cognitive development. Kohlberg speaks of the appearance and understanding of what is right and wrong from childhood to adulthood and explains by this transition through the identification of various levels of morality known as pre-conventional, conventional and post conventional. People will make decisions based on the understanding of the possible outcome and through reasoning of morals. (Target Concept)

Unfortunately, scandals like Enron are not isolated incidents and the last decade has offered Americans a disheartening perspective with comparable scandals like that of WorldCom and Tyco, Sunbeam, Global Crossing and many more. Companies have a concrete responsibility not just to their investors but to society as a whole to have practices which deter corporate greed and looting and which actively and effectively work to prevent such things from happening. This