ERIC Number: ED223513
Record Type: Non-Journal
Publication Date: 1982-Feb-1
Pages: 67
Abstractor: N/A
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: N/A
EISSN: N/A
Student Judgments of Responsibility and the Moral Atmosphere of High Schools: A Comparative Study. Revised.
Higgins, Ann; And Others
The moral judgment is assessed of high school students from three regular high schools and from three alternative high schools. Students from the alternative schools made and reinforced rules and settled issues in weekly community meetings based on participatory democracy. The study sought to ascertain the presence of responsibility judgments in the responses to the four moral dilemmas presented to participants. The hypothesis was that a judgment of responsibility is a mediating bridge between deontic judgments of rightness (in which the other's welfare seems to be a matter of right or claim) and moral action. Judgments which consider filling the other's need when it is not based on a right or claim is a responsibility concern. Democratic school students rated higher in making judgments of responsibility and in their stage of judgment; for example, they favored prosocial choice, demonstrated a high sense of collective prosocial norms, and expressed a strong sense of community. The best approach to moral education is one that attempts to reform the moral atmosphere in which individual decisions are made. (KC)
Publication Type: Reports - Research; Speeches/Meeting Papers
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: Harvard Univ., Cambridge, MA. Graduate School of Education.
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A