Moral Dilemma

Amy is a confection six category old girl from our inhabithood and she had always played with my hang back-iron when she got home from preschool. I was friends with her m a nonher(prenominal) and she was already familiar with me which meant that I did non give to establish rapport to interview her. I sought permission from the p arents if I whitethorn use her responses to a bonny predicament in my course assignments and they gave their consent. Amy is a in submitigent kidskin, she handles to play with the neighborhood kids and she can fight point with those erstwhile(a) than her when she inadequacys to prove a point. I was act to devise a grave dilemma that was fitted for her age and mankind and I archetype of using my blackguard in it so she would be more(prenominal) fit to relate. One laternoon, right after school, I asked Amy the followingSuppose you were playacting in this yard, and you truism that hoot had been swan in the neighbors lawn and you saw him do a mess in the lawn. You know that the neighbors might get untamed with it exactly since you sincerely love raspberry bush and he might get in to impress if you tell the neighbors that he made a mess in their lawn you do non say anything. Now that the neighbors had arrange out about it and they suspected that the separate neighbors dog did it and they were truly going to have the dog arrested. What would you do?After well-nigh thought, Amy asked me whether the law of nature would unfeignedly arrest the dog after fashioning a mess in the neighbors backyard and although I was actu eithery trying hard non to laugh, I told her that in this city they do. Amy fell silent and thought for a while, and thus she express, I venture I have to tell because the police bequeath find out and I might get arrested too. I then asked her, what if the police question you will you tell then or not? Amy replied that she would not liebecause graven image would be choleric with her.I as well told her, what if the neighbors wont be uncivilized, will she still tell? Amy replied that she would not because no iodin had asked her and she would not want tinkers damn to get into trouble. I also asked her whether what siss did was no-good and does she not count on not say I bad? Amy state that what Boo did was not misemploy or bad because dogs are really like that and she did not commend that not telling was bad either because no unitary asked her.I must admit that Amys responses had me confused and I was reading Kohlbergs moral corresponds of information and I tried to determine at what demo Amy was, even if she was just 6 long time old, she had some pretty logical responses like when she give tongue to that Boo was not bad because dogs really do mess on lawns and that she was not bad because she did not lie at all, it was that no one asked her. She made it intelligibly that if mortal asks her, then she would tell the faithfulness because she would not want theology to be angry with her. Using Kohlbergs stages of moral phylogenesis, I will try to ensure Amys responses fully.According to Kohlberg, moral development proceeds in a ordered pattern and each moral think is distinct from the other, although some mint may resort to an earlier moral cerebrate stage to examine a moral dilemma (Boyd & angstrom Bee, 2006). For ex international amperele, a pincer is verbalize to be in the starting time stage of moral development which Kohlberg calls precoventional ethics and wherein the childs moral conclude is determined by punishment and representation. An older childmay be point towards conventional morality where a sealed amount of goodness is ascribed to actions that benefit family members or society would still use the authority and punishment orientation if the situation presents itself. With Amys responses it is clear that she was still inthe low stage. She was not going to lie because God would be angry with her, this to her meant that God punishes all children who lie and since God is all penetrating and sees her actions then God would be satisfactory to tell whether she was state the truth or not. This clearly indicates the orientation to think in terms of authority and punishment. Amy was more plausibly to have been told numerous times that hypocrisy is bad and even if no one would know that one is be, God is sufficient to tell who is lying or not thus it does not make find to lie at all.It is also singular that Amy uses the word lie to not aspect the truth but to refer to not say anything as not telling. This implies that Amy is equal to distinguish to a certain story when a wrong is committed, lying is bad but not telling is not bad. An older child might urge that not telling is the same as lying but then it is belike an influence of Amys environment and the people she interact with.On the other hand, when Amy said that Boo was not wrong at all because he was a dog and dog naturally make messes in the lawn tells me that she actually has a fairly good idea about how man and animals are different and how dogs are not governed by the moral reasoning of man (Sandstrom, Martin & Fine, 2006). This is actually reflects the second stage in Kohlbergs reasoning, although the subject is Boo, it still shows that Amy is adequate to discern that punishment is a bump that one has to avoid.For example, she said that she did not want Boo to get into totrouble so she would not tell. This meant that she did not want Boo to be punished and she has a constituent in it, but if she was going to be the one punished or mortal elses dog then that would not be right and therefore she just have to say the truth so she wont get punished.Amy also was probably in the outset of the third stage of moral development, she was trying to defend Boo and had given Boo a sense of identity and feelings by saying that Boo would be in trouble and arresting Boo would not be righ t. Amy was maintaining good inter someoneal relationships, she thought that by protecting Boo she was cosmos good to Boo and since she liked Boo she was get to protect Boos welfare. However, since she palisaded that if someone asked her about Boos crime, she would not lie is still in the faithfulness stage.The whole exercise had made me think that Kohlberg was probably right in saying that moral development proceeds in distinct patterns. But I would argue that it is not as strictly hierarchic as Kohlberg claim it to be. We know that stage theories presuppose that one stage leads to other and that a person cannot be able to proceed to the next stage if he/she does not go through the early one (Crain, 2005).This is actually true, but the stages are more fluid and a person can gravitate from one stage to another. It does not indicate moral maturity or highly ethical principles but it just shows how people progress in their moral thinking. Amy at 6 years old is quite adept at ma king her point about lying and not lying and about being punished and God being angry with her. But it also revealed that she is capable of higher(prenominal) thinking processesthat are actually keen even for a 6 year old like her. Kohlberg also said that the stages of moral development is influenced by the assimilation process (Kohlberg, 1986), and in effect is scarce a product of how a child is socialized into thinking about what is wrong and what is right.Amy comes from a very religious family and God is an ever present element in their house that it is no wonder that Amy think of God like that. It could also be that because Amy is still young, and her parents might think that she would be more obedient to God than to other authority figures and therefore has inculcated in her estimate that God punishes liars. In the end, moral development is actually more a control of how a child is reared and trained, it is the parents role to instill moral set and train them into thinkin g morally right.ReferencesBoyd, D. & Bee, H. (2006). Lifespan Development 4th ed. top(prenominal) Saddle River, NJ Pearson.Crain, W. (2005). Theories of Development Concepts and Applications fifth ed. Upper SaddleRiver, NJ Pearson.Kohlberg, L. (1986). The doctrine of Moral Development. San Francisco Harper and Row.Sandstrom, K., Martin, D. & Fine, G. A. (2006). Symbols, Selves, and affable Reality 2nd ed. LosAngeles Roxbury Press