Social learning and Piaget's cognitive theory of moral development.

Abstract

Replicates with extended analyses, a previous study of moral judgment by A. Bandura and F. J. McDonald (see 38:2). In a pretest using a Piaget type of pairs of moral judgment stories, 77 5-12 yr. olds indicated which of 2 children in the stories was naughtier (names) and then justified their judgments (explanations). 32 of these Ss, 1/2 with a majority of high level judgments and 1/2 with a majority of low, were exposed to an adult model responding at the opposite level. A posttest with 6 repeated items, 6 new items, and 6 somewhat unusual items was given either immediately or 2 wk. after the modeling ("conditioning") session. Bandura and McDonald's results were replicated with additional support, but it was found that the extent of the modeling effects depended upon a number of variables either singly or in interaction: Ss pretest scores, the particular measure (names vs. explanations), time between conditioning and posttest, type of item, and direction of conditioning (up or down). A theoretical analysis showed that neither the present study nor that of Bandura and McDonald could be used directly to affirm or deny Piaget's hypotheses. Most of the present results serve as a basis for more differentiated statements concerning the models' effects, but some of the findings raise questions which cannot yet be answered within the social learning framework. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved)