ABSTRACT

In the previous chapters we used the term schemas, rather than stages, to describe what the DIT was measuring. We adopted this terminology to signal that the type of cognitive structure we envisioned was not like Kohlberg’s stages in several important ways: (a) We do not define cognitive structures in terms of “operations” (like Kohlberg’s “justice operations” inspired by Piaget’s INRC operations); (b) we do not endorse Kohlberg’s “hard stage” concept of development based on the staircase metaphor, nor the assumption that people are in one stage at a time; (c) we do not make the a priori claim of universality for the moral schemas (for us, the extent of cross-cultural uniformity in schemas is an empirical question); (d) we do not endorse Kohlberg’s radical purging content from structure in the Colby-Kohlberg scoring system. And, therefore, to signal exception with these assumptions, we used the term schema. We do keep Kohlberg’s notion that moral judgment structures are actively constructed by the individual, and that they follow a developmental sequence. We regard the core of Kohlberg’s theory as postulating a developmental sequence from conventional to postconventional thinking. As attached to the concept of stage as Kohlberg was, he did say, “I’d be happy to stop patching up Piagetian assumptions if I could see another boat on the horizon which handled my problems and data better than the stage concept” (Kohlberg, 1984, p. 425).