Deconstructing the elephant and the flag in the lavatory: promises and problems of moral foundations research

Moral Foundations research offers rich promise, opening up key questions about how affect and cognition are integrated in moral response, and exploring how different moral discourses may supply meaning and valence to moral experience. Haidt and his colleagues also associate different discourses with different political positions. However I address three problematic areas. First to what extent Haidt has succeeded in transcending the traditional dichotomy of affect and cognition, and created an integrative model of how moral intuitions actually work. Second, the analysis of cultural processes is too limited; moral responses are discursive, contextualized and constructed. Third, the political spectrum is complex and diverse; to be truly useful, the research on Moral Foundations must avoid parochial US political concerns and models.     

试论杜威实用主义德育理论与我国学校德育的走向

杜威在经验、实验和民主的哲学基础上，提出了以培养良好公民品格为目的，以儿童的社会生活为内容，以学校生活、教法和课程一体化为手段等一套完整的道德教育理论，影响着当今我国学校道德教育的实践。学校德育应通过学生主体地位的彰显、道德教育方法的重构，让道德教育回归生活，从而发挥出道德教育的真正价值。     

道德发展认知理论对当前学生道德发展中知行矛盾冲突解决策略的启示

面对学生道德发展中知行脱离的问题,道德发展认知理论尤其是柯尔伯格的三水平六阶段以及在此基础提出的道德教育模式为解决此类问题起到了指导作用。柯尔伯格的道德发展三水平六阶段：前习俗水平,包括服从与惩罚道德定向阶段和工具定向阶段;习俗水平,好孩子道德定向阶段和维护权威与秩序的道德定向阶段;后习俗水平,包括社会契约的道德定向阶段和普遍原则道德定向阶段。两种道德教育模式：道德讨论模式和公正团体模式。     

Neural correlates of moral sensitivity and moral judgment associated with brain circuitries of selfhood: A meta-analysis

The present study meta-analyzed 45 experiments with 959 subjects and 463 activation foci reported in 43 published articles that investigated the neural mechanism of moral functions by comparing neural activity between the moral task conditions and non-moral task conditions with the Activation Likelihood Estimation method. The present study examined the common activation foci of morality-related task conditions. In addition, the study compared the neural correlates of moral sensitivity with the neural correlates of moral judgment, which are the two functional components in the Neo-Kohlbergian model of moral functioning. The results showed that brain regions associated with the default mode network were significantly more active during morality-related task conditions than during non-morality task conditions. These brain regions were also commonly activated in both moral judgment and moral sensitivity task conditions. In contrast, the right temporoparietal junction and supramarginal gyrus were found to be more active only during conditions of moral judgment. These findings suggest that the neural correlates of moral sensitivity and moral judgment are perhaps commonly associated with brain circuitries of self-related psychological processes, but the neural correlates of those two functional components are distinguishable from each other.     

Clipping our dogmatic wings: The role of religion’s Parerga in our moral education

Abstract

In a note introduced into the second edition of Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason (1794), Kant assigns a systematic role to the General Remarks at the end of each Part of his book. He calls those Remarks, “as it were, parerga to religion within the boundaries of pure reason; they do not belong within it yet border on it” (RGV 6:52). As Kant sees them, the parerga are only a “secondary occupation” that consists in removing transcendent obstacles. This paper is skeptical of Kant's view. It proposes an alternative account, according to which the parerga are essential to our moral education, since they force human reason to confront its own limitations and resist the urge to take refuge in spurious religious beliefs. That urge, I argue, is linked to the propensity to evil, and uses religious orthodoxy to undermine moral religion. By clipping our dogmatic wings, the parerga encourage reason to face its own dialectical tendencies and direct its speculative interest to immanent practical use. This redirection counteracts the debilitating effects of the propensity to evil and plays a key role in our moral regeneration. To consider the parerga “derivative,” as Kant himself does, is therefore a grave mistake.     

Cognitive underpinnings of moral reasoning in adolescence: The contribution of executive functions

Adolescence is a developmental period characterized by intense changes, which impact the interaction between individuals and their environments. Moral reasoning (MR) is an important skill during adolescence because it guides social decisions between right and wrong. Identifying the cognitive underpinnings of MR is essential to understanding the development of this function. The aim of this study was to explore predictors of MR in typically developing adolescents (n = 92, 33 males, M = 16.3 years, SD = 2.2 years) and the specific contribution of higher order cognitive processing using an innovative visual MR assessment tool and measures of executive functioning and intelligence. MR maturity was correlated with four executive functions (cognitive flexibility, feedback utilization, conceptual reasoning, verbal fluency) and was predicted by four variables: age, intelligence, nonverbal flexibility and verbal fluency. Overall, these results contribute to a better understanding of MR during adolescence and highlight the importance of using innovative tools to measure social cognition.     

浅析道德判断中的认知与情绪归因

皮亚杰是首位系统研究儿童道德认知的心理学家,科尔伯格在继承皮亚杰研究的基础上,提出了道德判断的相关理论。他们的研究重点都集中在认知这一因素对道德判断的影响。近年来有研究者通过多项实验证明情绪在道德判断中同样发挥着重要的作用。     

Recovering the role of reasoning in moral education to address inequity and social justice

This article reasserts the centrality of reasoning as the focus for moral education. Attention to moral cognition must be extended to incorporate sociogenetic processes in moral growth. Moral education is not simply growth within the moral domain, but addresses capacities of students to engage in cross-domain coordination. Development beyond adolescence in moral thinking is in two forms: (1) the gradual application of morality in broader adult contexts, and (2) the result of social discourse and progressive readjustments at the individual and societal level of views of the morality of societal practices. Postconventional moral reasoning is not a rarified stage of moral cognition, but an orientation and set of discourse skills potentially available to all normally developing adult moral reasoners.     

The role of elevation in moral judgment

ABSTRACT

Elevation is the emotion elicited by witnessing acts of moral beauty and may be framed as the opposite of disgust. Two studies investigated the role of elevation in moral judgment and its relation to disgust. In Study 1 it was investigated whether elevation can attenuate the effects of disgust on moral transgression judgments. Participants were either induced to experience disgust (by giving them a bitter beverage), or to experience disgust and elevation simultaneously (by video induction). No effects of either emotion on moral transgression judgments were found. In Study 2 the nature of causal connectedness between elevation and moral virtue judgments was investigated by testing whether elevation amplifies moral virtue judgments. It was found that participants judged morally good acts as being more morally good when being elevated, suggesting that there is a bidirectional causal link between elevation and judgments of moral virtue.     

促进知行合一加强道德建设

道德认知与道德行为相统一,是道德建设的关键,在现实生活中,相当一部分道德主体的道德认知与道德行为之间存在着较大的落差,就在道德建设中如何促进知行合一的问题进行一些探讨很有必要.     

社会建构论对道德教育的启示

道德教育离不开社会环境和社会关系的制约,道德的建构与社会生活紧密相连,道德在本质上是从社会文化实践中建构出来的。社会建构论推动了道德教育的与时俱进,对推进现代化的道德教育具有重大意义。     

探索传统道德与社会主义道德相融合的德育新路

文章介绍了锦州师范学院结合“孝”字,实施德育教育的经验。     

论师德智慧的科学开发

师德智慧其实质是一种充满爱的价值观念,包括师德认知、师德情感和师德艺术三位一体的师德智慧系统.现代师德建设应遵循教师劳动的复杂性和创造性,着眼于培养和激发蕴藏在教师身上的师德智慧.     

Good and evil at school: Bullying and moral evaluation in early adolescence

We investigated how adolescents (sixth-graders, N = 357) morally evaluated hypothetical bullying and defending protagonists and whether these evaluations related to behavior in bullying as nominated by peers. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) resulted in four factors for the evaluation of the hypothetical bullies: Evil soul, Contempt, Cowardice, and Deviance, and five factors for the evaluation of the hypothetical defender: General admiration, Courage, Cool, Empathic care, and Fair justice. Corresponding scales were constructed. The findings showed that bullying positively correlated with evaluating the hypothetical bullies using Cowardice while victimization positively correlated with evaluating the hypothetical defender in terms of General admiration, Empathic care, and Fair justice. MANOVA for each of the two sets of the evaluative scales indicated that behavioral status (bully, victim, defender, or uninvolved) had a significant effect on the moral evaluation of hypothetical bullies, and no significant effect on the moral evaluation of the hypothetical defender.     

The role of consequences of moral action in maximizing moral elevation

Moral elevation is described as a state of positive emotion that includes uplifting feelings, positive views of humanity and a desire to be a better person. Numerous empirical studies have demonstrated that elevation has powerful effects on people’s moral intention and behavior. The next step is to investigate how to maximize the emotion of elevation. According to the evolution of moral elevation research and the theory of moral disgust, we hypothesized that the consequences of moral action would influence moral elevation. The results of two studies in the present research (Study 1: N = 122, average age = 36.96 years; Study 2: N = 232, average age = 23.93 years) demonstrated that moral acts with good consequences were more effective in inducing moral elevation than moral acts with bad consequences. The implications for research and practice are discussed.     

Integrating moral and social development within middle school social studies: a social cognitive domain approach

Eleven teachers and 254 urban middle-school students comprised the sample of this study examining the social and moral development outcomes of the integration of social cognitive domain theory within regular classroom instruction. Participating teachers were trained to construct and implement history lessons that stimulated students’ moral reasoning and conceptions of societal convention. In comparison with baselines and controls, teachers reduced didactic instruction and increased the proportion of class time devoted to small group discussions. Student engagement in transactive discourse significantly increased in participating classes with significantly greater post-test levels of moral reasoning, concepts of social convention, and cross-domain coordination. Student production of operational versus representational transacts through transactive discussion was associated with growth in moral and societal concepts. Teachers continued teaching lessons constructed in the project a year after the research ended.     

德育实效性思考

德育实效性问题的提出是有它特定的时代背景的，这个背景应该是社会的转型。德育实效性问题的凸现是有它产生的原因的，其根本原因也在于社会转型。为了适应转型时期社会的要求和学生的特点，提高德育的实效性，必须开展德育科研，提高教师育德素质，坚持以学生为本的道德关怀，实现以对话为德育的主要方式。     

道德认知发展理论对我国德育改革的启示

科尔伯格的道德认知发展理论推动了学校德育从传统模式向现代的转型,对扭转西方社会剧变的思想混乱和德育危机产生了重要作用。在当代的教育改革中,我国的德育在目标、模式、内容、途径等方面受到了前所未有的挑战,科尔伯格的道德认知发展理论给我国德育改革以有益的启示。     

网络德育：道德自律的觉醒与道德人格的重塑

网络道德教育的落脚点和归宿是促使道德生活主体的道德自律意识的觉醒，并在此基础上重塑主体性道德人格。这是人的主体性的道德人格发展的历史性、内在性和现实性的必然要求。觉醒和重塑的途径即要从外在的影响因素方面考虑，又要从内在的主体意识发展方面入手。     

The relevance of nomadic forager studies to moral foundations theory: moral education and global ethics in the twenty-first century

Moral foundations theory (MFT) proposes the existence of innate psychological systems, which would have been subjected to selective forces over the course of evolution. One approach for evaluating MFT, therefore, is to consider the proposed psychological foundations in relation to the reconstructed Environment of Evolutionary Adaptedness. This study draws upon ethnographic data on nomadic forager societies to evaluate MFT. Moral foundations theory receives support only regarding the Caring/harm and Fairness/cheating foundations but not regarding the proposed Loyalty/betrayal and Authority/subversion foundations. These latter two proposed foundations would seem to reflect the historical classic assumptions of modernity, involving self-interest, competition, individualism, hierarchy, authority and so forth. Studying the ethical dimensions of nomadic forager societies can highlight our biases about the foundations of morality, some of which may be steeped in particularist Western political and social traditions. Some recent developments from cosmopolitanism are discussed as an alternative evolving worldview that parallels nomadic forager ethos.