Stages
Kohlberg's six stages can be more generally grouped into three levels of two stages each: pre-conventional, conventional and post-conventional. Following Piaget's constructivist requirements for a stage model, as described in his theory of cognitive development, it is extremely rare to regress in stages—to lose the use of higher stage abilities. Stages cannot be skipped; each provides a new and necessary perspective, more comprehensive and differentiated than its predecessors but integrated with them.
- Level 1 (Pre-Conventional)
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- 1. Obedience and punishment orientation
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- (How can I avoid punishment?)
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- 2. Self-interest orientation
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- (What's in it for me?)
- (Paying for a benefit)
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- 1. Obedience and punishment orientation
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- Level 2 (Conventional)
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- 3. Interpersonal accord and conformity
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- (Social norms)
- (The good boy/good girl attitude)
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- 4. Authority and social-order maintaining orientation
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- (Law and order morality)
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- 3. Interpersonal accord and conformity
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- Level 3 (Post-Conventional)
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- 5. Social contract orientation
- 6. Universal ethical principles
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- (Principled conscience)
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The understanding gained in each stage is retained in later stages, but may be regarded by those in later stages as simplistic, lacking in sufficient attention to detail.
Read more about this topic: Lawrence Kohlberg's Stages Of Moral Development
Famous quotes containing the word stages:
“The playing adult steps sideward into another reality; the playing child advances forward to new stages of mastery....Childs play is the infantile form of the human ability to deal with experience by creating model situations and to master reality by experiment and planning.”
—Erik H. Erikson (20th century)
“Phlebas the Phoenician, a fortnight dead,
Forgot the cry of gulls, and the deep sea swell
And the profit and loss.
A current under sea
Picked his bones in whispers. As he rose and fell
He passed the stages of his age and youth
Entering the whirlpool.”
—T.S. (Thomas Stearns)
“The four stages of man are infancy, childhood, adolescence and obsolescence.”
—Art Linkletter (20th century)