Effects of Person Perception on the Development of Children's Moral Judgments

Abstract

Summary The present study examined the effects of five variables on children's moral judgments: two person perception variables, (wealth and health), past intent, present intent, and consequence. Ss were 120 boys and girls between 5–10 years of age who were asked to make moral judgments on eight paired stories. Positive person variables, negative intention, and small intentional consequences were consistently paired with negative person variables, positive intentions, and large intentional consequences. The younger children were found to base their judgments almost exclusively on consequence. The middle age group increasingly took note of past character. The older children while continuing to refer to consequence and character mentioned present intent to a limited extent. The predominant use of the consequence rationale by some of the older children may be a function of the following: the biasing effect of the situation, a delayed development from “objective” to “subjective” rationales, or a regression fr...