The developmental origins of moral concern: An examination of moral boundary decision making throughout childhood.

ABSTRACT: Prominent theorists have made the argument that modern humans express moral concern for a greater number of entities than at any other time in our past. Moreover, adults show stable patterns in the degrees of concern they afford certain entities over others, yet it remains unknown when and how these patterns of moral decision-making manifest in development. Children aged 4 to 10 years (N = 151) placed 24 pictures of human, animal, and environmental entities on a stratified circle representing three levels of moral concern. Although younger and older children expressed similar overall levels of moral concern, older children demonstrated a more graded understanding of concern by including more entities within the outer reaches of their moral circles (i.e., they were less likely to view moral

SUBMITTER: Neldner K 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5973598 | biostudies-literature | 2018

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature