Self and Moral Development in Middle Childhood Through Early Adolescence

1. Self and Moral Development in Middle Childhood Through Early Adolescence The Life Span Human Development for Healthcare Professionals, Chapter 7

2. Self-Concept • The Development of Self-Concept • By the age of 7, we have the foundation for our self-concept laid, the next step is to build upon that. • We build upon our self-concept as we develop cognitively. Cognitive development goes hand-in-hand with development of the self-concept. • Development of the ME and all of its subcomponents.

3. Structure of the Self-Concept • Illustration on page 234 in Broderick & Blewitt shows that our general self-concept is a hierarchical development built of our other self-concepts. • Table 7.1 (page 235) shows the domains of self-concept across the life span. Basically it shows how each level builds towards the next. • Academic and Nonacademic self-concepts

4. Influences on the Development of Self-Concept • James: Self-esteem is a ratio of our successes to our aspirations-or-how many times we succeed versus how many times we’ve tried. • Social comparison: basing your performance against that of a peer • Self-enhancing bias: maintaining moderately positive beliefs about ourselves when compared to others. • Downward social comparison-the type of comparison where a person compares themselves to someone less competent, successful when the person’s self-esteem is at stake.

5. Gender, Racial, and Ethnic Differences • Girls tend to “lose voice” when they enter the school setting (Brown & Gilligan, 1992). • Cultural roles of girls/women • Teacher/student interactions • Becomes a way of holding connections with others, even though they lose their ability to form/express their own opinion. • Self-esteem slide: adults believing girls have lower self-esteem may lead to that lower self-esteem.

6. Gender, Racial, and Ethnic Differences • Race & Ethnicity • Doll study findings • Strategies for maintaining self-esteem • attributing negative feedback to the prejudice maintained by the advanced majority • Make social comparisons to their ethnic group instead of the advanced majority • Enhance the self-concepts for their groups at which they excel.

7. The Moral Self • Morality: the ability to make decisions based on what’s right and wrong and preferring to act in a way that is best described as being “right”. • Conscience: an internalized set of standards and principles that guides our behavior • Knowledge of morals is not a guarantee that they’ll be followed • Since 1982, the number of K-12 students that have self-reported cheating in school has risen from approximately 30% to over 65%.

8. Some Classic Theories of Moral Development • Freud: our morals are based upon fights between our id and our super-ego: the super-ego develops to keep the id from becoming too out of control.

9. Some Classic Theories of Moral Development

10. Some Classic Theories of Moral Development • Kohlberg’s Theories • Preconventional • Stage 1: Punishment and obedience orientation • Stage 2: Concrete, individualistic orientation • Conventional • Stage 3: Social-relational perspective • Stage 4: Member of society perspective • Postconventional • Stage 5: Prior rights and social contract • Stage 6: Universal ethical principles

11. The Moral Self (revisited) • Children’s Prosocial Behavior • Altruism • Emotions as a source of helping behavior • Empathy • Sympathy

12. Children’s Antisocial Behavior • Antisocial behavior is often found in children that have not achieved very high levels of moral development. We see different types and onsets: • Early-starter: starts before the age of 5 • Can lead to numerous other problems • Oppositional Defiant Disorder or Conduct Disorder • Antisocial Personality Disorder • Adolescent onset: behavior begins in early adolescence.

13. Children’s Antisocial Behavior • Influences on development of antisocial behavior • Physiological and Neuropsychological Influences • Environmental Influences • Coercive Family Interaction • Social Cognitive Influences • Social Information Processing • Hostile Attributional Bias