Moral Judgment as a Function of Age, Sex, and Stimulus

Summary Individual differences in moral judgment as related to age and sex of Ss and stimulus variables of sex of story-model and situational familiarity-remoteness were investigated. An objective instrument based on Kohlberg's dilemmas was developed and administered to 240 boys and girls at three age levels. Developmental trends in moral judgments as predicted by Kohlberg's theory were obtained, lending validity to the objective measure. While level of moral judgment was comparable for boys and girls at ages 11 and 17, 14-year-old girls showed higher moral reasoning than their male peers. Higher level moral judgments were made for remote dilemmas and for those with same sex story models.