Moral Development

How can we understand one’s morality? Moreover, how can we name a behavior or belief as a good or bad? Both Piaget and Kohlberg viewed moral development as a result of deliberate attempt to increase the coordination and integration of one’s orientation to the world (Kohlberg, L. 1963)[1]. However, Kohlberg additionally further developed Piaget’s notions. While, Piaget indicated that children aged 2 to 7 years, who are in the Preoperational Period, have difficulty in seeing points of view other than their own, Kohlberg showed that children aged between 2-7 are able to think through social systems perspective.

Kohlberg outlined three broad levels and six more specific stages of moral development. When he was trying to outline this developmental process, he applied a cross-sectional study and investigated an ethical dilemma. He sought answers to a story concerned a man named Heinz. His wife was dying of a disease that could be cured if he could get a certain medicine.  When he asked the pharmacist, he was told that he could get the medicine, but only at a very high price - one that Heinz could not possibly afford.  So the next evening, Heinz broke into the pharmacy and stole the drug to save his wife's life.  Was Heinz right or wrong to steal the drug? By studying the answers from children of different ages to these questions Kohlberg hoped to discover the ways in which moral reasoning changed as people grew. The sample comprised 72 Chicago boys aged 10–16 years, 58 of whom were followed up at three-yearly intervals for 20 years (Kohlberg, 1984)[2].

As a result, he found out individuals generally proceeds from a pre-conventional stage (selfish desires and avoiding punishment, to a conventional stage (social systems perspective) and finally to a post conventional stage (ethical principles, sense of justice, notion of most good to most number of people). Although, his findings were supported by many other researches, it has also been criticized for many reasons.

First of all, we have to consider the case of researching answers to ethical dilemmas. As long as, decisions may vary with the situation and our position in that situation, we would not be able to respond correctly to the questions of ethical problems since they are not authentic situations. It is possible to respond to the Heinz Dilemma through the lens of justice, if we are not experiencing the situation. However, it is highly probable to try everything we can do in order to save the one we love, if we are experiencing the situation. Then, how can we blame someone as displaying bad behavior or immature morality, if he/she just trying to save a human life. Or think about one having an abortion. Can we blame an individual, if it is not possible for her to raise her child because of life conditions, such as, welfare and economical situations?

Others have argued that Kohlberg's stages are culturally biased and it is based on Western philosophical traditions. This criticism may have merit. One wonders how well Kohlberg's stages apply to the great Eastern philosophies. One also wonders if his stages do justice to moral development in many traditional village cultures. Researchers find that villagers stop at stage 3, but perhaps they continue to develop moralities in directions that Kohlberg's stages fail to capture (W.C. Crain. 1985)[3].

Another criticism is that Kohlberg's theory is sex-biased. As a contrary to Kohlberg’s findings that women score lower than men, Gilligan has tried to show that women have their own insights of ethics in the form of care and responsibility rather than conventionally expected beliefs. In fact, women also continue to develop their thinking beyond stage 3, however, morality centers on interpersonal relationships and ethics of care instead of rights and rules for them.

Thus, it is true that there is a common progress in moral development; still we cannot think these stages as upgrading system. Further, we cannot discriminate one’s acts as right and wrong in such an ethical dilemmas like the Heinz’s Story. Therefore, we have to remember that we cannot judge one’s morality from a narrow perspective; we also have to consider social and personal aspects of morality.

References:

[1] Kohlberg, L. (1963).Kohlberg’s study helped researcher’s understand how and why children behave and act in certain ways when dealt with social dilemmas. The development of children's orientations toward a moral order: I. Sequence in the development of moral thought. Vita Humana, 6, 11-33.

[2] Kohlberg, L. (1984). Essays on moral development: Vol. 2. The psychology of moral development: Moral stages, their nature and validity.

[3] W.C. Crain. (1985). Theories of Development. Prentice-Hall. pp. 118-136., Chapter Seven, Kohlberg’s Stages of Moral Development

Bilingualism Matters

According to the National Center for Educational Statistics, more than one in 5 school-aged children (21%) speak a language other than English at home. It has been estimated that half of the world’s population is bilingual. Bilingualism happens due to many different reasons. These reasons can be: immigration, education, intermarriage or other reasons. Many researches have been conducted towards finding the effects of being bilingual. Some researches indicated that being bilingual has some negative effects on children, whereas the other researches have shown that being bilingual has some many positive effects on individual’s mental abilities.

There is a one wrong belief that children who raised bilingual will always mix their languages. However, children can quickly learn what to use where it is needed. If bilingual children interact in both bilingual and monolingual situations, then they learn to mix languages at certain times only (François Grosjean). If we give aside the fears of parents’ thoughts of children will be confused because of being bilingual, we can start to see the importance of it.

Researches have shown that bilingualism is beneficial for children’s development. If a child exposed to different languages, than the child becomes more aware of different cultures, aspects and points of views. Also, bilinguals tend to be better than monolinguals at ‘multitasking’, focusing attention and are more capable to learn a new language.

Many researchers conducted experiments about the relationship between bilinguals and the risk of dementia and some researches have shown significant results. In the article of ‘Bilingualism: Consequences for Mind and Brain’ it is stated that, bilingualism has a somewhat muted effect in adulthood but a larger role in older age, protecting against cognitive decline. In adolescence period, bilinguals can have some difficulties about verbal skills and vocabulary. Overall, at all ages they demonstrate better executive control than monolinguals.  Better executive control leads to becoming better in high-level thinking, multitasking and ability to sustaining attention. As a result, better cognitive performance throughout the lifespan. Therefore, as a contrary to the formers beliefs, bilingualism gives children more than two languages.

Besides, all the benefits of being bilingual, it shouldn’t be considered wrong. Nowadays, some parents are just obsessed with the achievement of their kids. Children spend much more time with their nonnative speaking caretakers than spending time with their parents. It is for sure that learning a new language in early ages is very crucial and has many positive effects on children. However, we also have to think the consequences of some extreme situations. A child who is raised by a caretaker will not be able to set attachment with his/her parents and therefore will have a tendency to develop reckless, avoidant and ambivalent behavior. For this reasons, parenting has a great impact on every aspect of child development. Bilingualism matters, but not forgetting the importance of moderate environmental effects and secure attachment matters more in order to raise well-developed children.

References:

[1] American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, The Advantages of Being Bilingual

[2] François Grosjean’s new book, Bilingual: Life and Reality, Harvard University, 2010

[3] Bilingualism: Consequences for Mind and Brain, Ellen Bialystok, Fergus I.M. Craik and Gigi Luk

Language Development

What make humans different from animals? We can assume that both humans and nonhumans have language skills. However, the distinction is, while humans can use language in an intelligent manner, nonhuman’s use it just to signaling things and not in a sophisticated approach. The evolution of language may have required the evolution of vocal flexibility such as seen in human infants at a very early stage. In a research conducted, it has shown that human fetuses are able to memorize auditory stimuli from the external world. Whereas French newborns preferred to produce rising melody contours, German newborns more often produced falling contours (this patterns are consistent with the intonation patterns in both of these languages). This can be related to their ability to discriminate sounds even from their mother’ womb, such as their ability to separate male to female voice or from happy to neutral vocal. It has also shown in the ‘Werker’s Sound Discrimination Research’, infants are able to discriminate sounds until they are 10 months.  In the 1^st year, differential attention to native versus nonnative accents decreases as infants develop a sense of language constancy for the common native language.

The development of language in infancy and early childhood is one of the most crucial skills that can be accomplished by humans. Infants start to say their first words around 1 year of age and around 3 years they become capable of knowing more than 1500 words. Then they also become capable of putting words together and start to use language grammatically significant. Language development is also a good example for social learning through interaction with individuals and environment. Therefore, parenting is very important in such a period. Promoting child’s language development by using natural everyday activities, adjusting the way you talk to help children, developing more advance language skills, improving interaction are just several things that can be done while children developing their language skills.

Well then, the question stands still. Do our genetics or environment play a greater role in language acquisition? There are mainly three aspects of how a language learning ability develops. First one is: Learning Theory, which indicates that language acquired through reinforcements from environment (which cannot clarify the sophisticated language). Second one is: Interactionist Approach, which indicated that, there should be appropriate conditions of both biological and social in order to learn language. And the third one is: nativist/innatist perspective, which is pioneered by Noam Chomsky. It is believed that children are born with the ability to learn language. He proposed that children are born with a language acquisition device (LAD), an innate ability to understand the principles of language. Once exposed to language, the LAD allows children to learn the language at a remarkable pace. Linguist Eric Lenneberg suggests that like many other human behaviors, the ability to acquire language is subject to what are known as critical periods.

We can dramatically see the proof of the ‘sensitive time in language learning’ from the feral children. In the story of Genie, who has kept in a small room for 13 years without any communication to outside world, she founded with lack of many crucial skills. The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) provided funding for scientific research on Genie’s case. She soon began to make rapid progression in specific areas, quickly learning how to use the toilet and dress herself. Over the next few months, she began to experience more developmental progress, but remained poor in areas such as language. She has not only miss the critical period for learning language, she was also horrifically abused. In the end, researchers were left to wonder whether Genie had suffered from cognitive deficits caused by her years of abuse or if she had been born with some degree of mental retardation.

References:

[1] Functional Flexibility of infant vocalization and the emergence of language, D. Kimbrough Oller, Eugene H. Buder, Heather L. Ramsdell, Anne S. Warlaumont, Lesya Chorna, and Roger Bakeman

[2] Newborns’ Cry Melody Is Shaped by Their Native Language, Birgit Mampe, Angela D. Friederici, Anne Christophe, and Kathleen Wermke

[3] The Development of Language Constancy: Attention to Native Versus Nonnative Accents, Christine Kitamura, Catherine T. Best, Robin Panneton

[4] The Hanen Centre, Learning Language and Loving It

[5] Lenneberg, E. (1967), Biological Foundations of Language, New York: Wiley

[6] Rymer, R. (1993), Genie: A scientific tragedy, New York: Harper Collins

Executive Functioning: Key Ingredient in Lifetime Performance

Some people are hard-working and complete their jobs immediately, whereas others wait till the last day to complete their duties. While, some students can act according to rules, others can’t. Why do people differ in their ability to control their thoughts and behaviors? What are the cognitive and biological bases of individual differences?

Our brain and mind develops through our lifetime and at the center of this structure, we have skills called executive functioning. Executive functioning is a set of general-purpose control processes that regulate one’s thoughts and behaviors. It is a mental process that helps connect past experience with present action. This feature of executive functioning is also important for meaningful learning. Considering, the most important single factor influencing learning is what the learner already knows. People use executive functioning to perform activities such as planning, organizing, strategizing, paying attention to and remembering details, and managing time and space. It highly correlates with metacognitive skills of an individual. This process requires not just thinking about your own thinking, it also requires the strategies that you going to use to accomplish a certain duty.

Therefore, a child has to manage and regulate a lot of information and at the same time s/he has to avoid distractions. Obviously, sometimes there can be individuals who are struggling with these skills. This deficit leads many students to have learning disabilities. The prefrontal cortex is important for executive function. But, it also involves controlling your behavior through its interactions with all other parts of the brain.  Executive functions improve radically over the first few years and it continues to improve through adolescence. A research has conducted to determine the frequency, nature, and severity of executive dysfunction (EDF) at 8 years of age in extremely low birth weight (ELBW)/very preterm infants who were born in the 1990s, compared with normal birth weight (NBW) control subjects. The ELBW/very preterm cohort exhibited significant EDF compared with their NBW peers in all areas assessed. The ELBW/very preterm children also displayed more behavioral problems indicative of EDF than the NBW children. So, we can explicitly see that innate traits and developmental process have a great effect on executive functioning.

However, these are not the only concepts, which affects executive functions. As well as a person’s executive function abilities are shaped by physical changes in the brain and it also affects by life experiences. Still, who have executive dysfunction can be successful in life. Early attentions to develop these skills are crucial. Giving direct instructions, continual reassurance and accurate feedback are essential steps in the way to develop individuals’ executive function abilities. There are many people who struggle with executive dysfunctions. However, there is one thing that they have to remember: It is not a failure and they can achieve success! Early attentions of sophisticated instructors are essential in order for the successful development of these capacities.

References:

[1] National Center for Learning Disabilities, What is executive functioning?, NCLD Editorial Team

[2] Center on the Developing Child, Harvard University, InBrief: Executive Function: Skills for Life and Learning

[3] Executive Functioning in School-Aged Children Who Were Born Very Preterm or With Extremely Low Birth Weight in the 1990s, Peter J. Anderson, PhD, Lex W. Doyle, MD, Victorian Infant Collaborative Study Group, Offical Journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics

[4] The Nature and Organization of Individual Differences in Executive Functions: Four General Conclusions, Akira Miyake and Naomi P. Friedman, Department of Psychology and Neuroscience, University of Colorado at Boulder and Institute for Behavioral Genetics, University of Colorado at Boulder

Your Memory Is You!

You would probably heard many people saying ‘I have a bad memory.’ or ‘It was a long time ago, it’s impossible for me to remember that event.’ Having a bad memory is commonly thought like a characteristic of an individual. However when we consider about these situations, both of them have cognitive reasons. Mainly, forgetting happens when an individual fails to encode or retrieve the information. Three stages are essential for the transfer of the information. These are: sensory memory, working memory and long-term memory. We can think of working memory as the active part in this system. Besides the importance of working memory, attention should be the first step in this process. Individuals have to have a reason and curiosity to learn in order to knowledge become memorable. Also, learning must be meaningful and individuals should be able to make connections with related knowledge already in the long-term memory.

Memory is the ability, which develops in childhood and expands through our experiences. The loss of memory in older age can be painful, however it is a developmental process likewise the fact that we can’t remember our infancy. Language, capitals of countries, types of animals… All the things that you can imagine are learned through our environment. And when you asked something from what you have learned, you try to give an answer to the question, which means, you actually retrieve the information from your long-term memory.

Remembering things feel very simple and you don’t think the process of how you remember. Our memory shapes our identity. From birth and even from mother’s womb, our brain has a remarkable ability. It interacts with our environment and continuously changes by the experiences we have. However, remembering doesn’t begin immediately from birth. Some research have shown that remembering starts with the development of self-concept sense. As individuals become more aware of themselves and effects of their environment on themselves, then they become able to remember. Before the emergence of self, individuals seem themselves just like observers and think that all the events are happening out of their territory. After the emergence of self, individuals starts to get the sense of things are not happening out of their territory, it is happening to them. We can clearly see the signs of this change in the child and mirror test.

Expressing ourselves, speaking, eating, going to work, taking shower… We need memory for every single thing that we do. Our memory contains everything about ourselves. After all, it is still couldn’t fully understand exactly how you remember or what occurs during recall.

References:

[1] How Does Your Memory Work - Biology Psychology Documentary, Lesson created by Nisreen Mohamedali

[2] National Center for Learning Disabilities, What is working memory and why does is matter?, Annie Stuart