Kohlberg, Lawrence - Introduction

Introduction

1927–1987

AMERICAN PSYCHOLOGIST, EDUCATOR

UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO, PhD, 1958

Lawrence Kohlberg was regarded for many years as a leader in the field of moral education and development. Trained in an institution identified with the progressive education ideals of American philosopher John Dewey, Kohlberg came to be regarded by his colleagues as more of an educator than a psychologist. Dissatisfied with the traditional character formation, behaviorist, and psychoanalytic models of moral behavior that were available to educators in the 1960s, Kohlberg worked out an approach to moral development known as cognitive structuralism, or cognitive developmentalism. This approach focuses on the growing child's processes of moral reasoning and the changes that take place in the structures of a person's thinking as he or she matures from childhood into adult life. Cognitive developmentalists regard children as independent agents capable of thinking for themselves about moral issues, as contrasted with the Freudian view of children as passive recipients of moral values imposed on them by adults. Kohlberg is best known for his stage theory, which postulated that human moral development progresses through a series of cognitive stages defined as total ways of thinking about moral issues rather than as attitudes toward specific situations.

Kohlberg regarded his work as interdisciplinary, insofar as he believed that moral education must combine psychological research with the insights of moral philosophy. He named John Dewey and Émile Durkheim as his predecessors in the "grand tradition" of unifying these two disciplines. Kohlberg believed that he had succeeded in meeting four requirements that he considered essential to a satisfactory system of moral education:

  • It should be based on "the psychological and sociological facts of moral development."
  • It should make use of educational methods that stimulate moral change.
  • It should be based on a "philosophically defensible" definition of morality.
  • It should be compatible with a system of government that guarantees freedom of religious belief.

Although cognitive developmentalists dominated moral education programs for a number of years—Kohlberg's stage theory has been outlined in every college-level psychology textbook published in the past three decades—their approach has been partially supplanted since the early 1980s by character education models. Because of Kohlberg's interest in the practical application of his educational theories as well as their relationship to other disciplines, he did not have extensive influence within the field of psychology itself. In addition, he did not leave behind a large collection of writings or major institutional foundations. Kohlberg's publications were almost entirely in the form of journal articles or book chapters, many coauthored with colleagues, rather than book-length, single-author manuscripts. And although he founded the Center for Moral Education at Harvard shortly after he came to the university, the Center survives as of the early 2000s only in the form of the Risk and Prevention program within the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Moreover, Kohlberg's theories drew considerable criticism from psychologists as well as educators, even during his lifetime. He was, however, widely admired as a teacher, and it may well be that his most important legacy to psychology is the number of former students that he inspired to enter the field.