Moral Dilemma

Amy is a sweet six year hoary girl from our neighborhood and she had always played with my go after when she got home from preschool. I was friends with her mother and she was already familiar with me which meant that I did non prolong to order rapport to interview her. I sought permission from the p arents if I whitethorn use her responses to a chasteistic dilemma in my course assignments and they gave their consent. Amy is a precocious tyke, she likes to play with the neighborhood kids and she can wall change surface with those old(a) than her when she wants to prove a point. I was trying to devise a lesson dilemma that was fitted for her age and reality and I thought process of using my dog in it so she would be more adequate to(p) to relate. One afternoon, right(a) after school, I asked Amy the followingSuppose you were playing in this yard, and you cut that shit had been wandering in the neighbors lawn and you saw him do a fixture in the lawn. You get by that the neighbors might lounge around black with it but since you truly love Boo and he might stun in to trouble if you evidence the neighbors that he made a messiness in their lawn you do not pronounce anything. Now that the neighbors had found come forth or so it and they suspected that the other neighbors dog did it and they were re onlyy going to have the dog arrested. What would you do?After some thought, Amy asked me whether the constabulary would really arrest the dog after making a mess in the neighbors backyard and although I was real trying stern not to laugh, I told her that in this city they do. Amy fell silent and thought for a while, and wherefore she verbalise, Iguess I have to tell because the police go out find out and I might arrive at arrested too. I consequently asked her, what if the police question you will you tell then or not? Amy replied that she would not liebecause beau moodl would be risky with her.I also told her, what if the neighbors wont be angry, will she still tell? Amy replied that she would not because no bingle had asked her and she would not want Boo to get into trouble. I also asked her whether what Boo did was gravid and does she not esteem not telling I swelled? Amy utter that what Boo did was not ravish or bad because dogs are really like that and she did not hypothesise that not telling was bad both because no nonpareil asked her.I must admit that Amys responses had me upset(a) and I was reading Kohlbergs goodistic stages of development and I try to determine at what stage Amy was, even if she was just 6 days old, she had some pretty logical responses like when she said 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 urinate that if someone asks her, then she would tell the fairness because she would not want God to be angry with her. Using Kohlbergs stages of moral developmen t, I will try to examine Amys responses fully.According to Kohlberg, moral development return in a successive pattern and each moral cerebrate is distinct from the other, although some passel may resort to an earlier moral reasoning stage to examine a moral dilemma (Boyd & Bee, 2006). For example, a child is said to be in the first stage of moral development which Kohlberg calls precoventional morality and wherein the childs moral reasoning is contumacious by punishment and authority. An older childmay be point towards conventional morality where a certain amount of goodness is ascribed to actions that eudaimonia family members or society would still use the authority and punishment preference if the situation presents itself. With Amys responses it is clear that she was still inthe first 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 knowing and sees her actions then God would be able to tell whether she was saying the truth or not. This clearly indicates the preference to think in terms of authority and punishment. Amy was more likely to have been told numerous times that fabrication is bad and even if no one would know that one is evasiveness, God is able to tell who is lying or not thus it does not make sense to lie at all.It is also noteworthy that Amy uses the word lie to not saying the truth but to refer to not saying anything as not telling. This implies that Amy is able to distinguish to a certain degree when a wrong is committed, lying is bad but not telling is not bad. An older child might argue that not telling is the same as lying but then it is probably 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 of course make messes in the lawn tells me that she actually has a fairly good idea about how man and animals are different and ho w 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 able to discern that punishment is a risk 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 role in it, but if she was going to be the one punished or someone elses dog then that would not be right and therefrom 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 foster 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 right. Amy was maintaining good inter soulfulnessal relationships, she thought that by protect Boo she was being good to Boo and since she liked Boo she was stimulate to protect Boos welfare. Howalways, since she argued that if someone asked her about Boos crime, she would not lie is still in the obedience stage.The whole answer 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 hierarchical as Kohlberg claim it to be. We know that stage theories presuppose that one stage leads to another and that a person cannot be able to proceed to the next stage if he/she does not go through the first 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 extremely ethical principles but it just shows how people progress in their moral persuasion. Amy at 6 years old is quite adept at making 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 thi nking processesthat are actually rational even for a 6 year old like her. Kohlberg also said that the stages of moral development is influenced by the socialization process (Kohlberg, 1986), and in do is merely 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 mind that God punishes liars. In the end, moral development is actually more a function of how a child is reared and trained, it is the parents role to instill moral values and train them into thinking morally right.ReferencesBoyd, D. & Bee, H. (2006). Lifespan maturation 4th ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ Pearson.Crain, W. (2005). Theories of Development Concepts a nd Applications 5th ed. Upper SaddleRiver, NJ Pearson.Kohlberg, L. (1986). The Philosophy of Moral Development. San Francisco harpist and Row.Sandstrom, K., Martin, D. & Fine, G. A. (2006). Symbols, Selves, and Social Reality 2nd ed. LosAngeles Roxbury Press