Some Day When I Have More than 22 Minutes

I'm going to further develop my ideas on this subject. But I am realizing one of the huge disconnects between my children and I is their moral development. Now grant it, this is a disconnect for ALL parents, but as children grow older they typically progress through the initial stages, whereas our children with histories of abuse and neglect who are dealing with issues of grief and loss get stuck.

Kohlberg wrote about 6 stages of Moral Development. You can read all about it here if you are interested. I studied it both as an undergrad and in grad school, but I have been revisiting it the past couple days. I'm cutting and pasting parts of that website here.

Stage 1. Obedience and Punishment Orientation. : The child assumes that powerful authorities hand down a fixed set of rules which he or she must unquestioningly obey. Kohlberg calls stage 1 thinking "preconventional" because children do not yet speak as members of society. Instead, they see morality as something external to themselves, as that which the big people say they must do.

Stage 2. Individualism and Exchange. At this stage children recognize that there is not just one right view that is handed down by the authorities. Different individuals have different viewpoints. You might have noticed that children at both stages 1 and 2 talk about punishment. However, they perceive it differently. At stage 1 punishment is tied up in the child's mind with wrongness; punishment "proves" that disobedience is wrong. At stage 2, in contrast, punishment is simply a risk that one naturally wants to avoid.


Stage 3. Good Interpersonal Relationships. At this stage children--who are by now usually entering their teens--see morality as more than simple deals. They believe that people should live up to the expectations of the family and community and behave in "good" ways. Good behavior means having good motives and interpersonal feelings such as love, empathy, trust, and concern for others.

Stage 4. Maintaining the Social Order. Stage 3 reasoning works best in two-person relationships with family members or close friends, where one can make a real effort to get to know the other's feelings and needs and try to help. At stage 4, in contrast, the respondent becomes more broadly concerned with society as a whole. Now the emphasis is on obeying laws, respecting authority, and performing one's duties so that the social order is maintained.


Stage 5. Social Contract and Individual Rights. At stage 4, people want to keep society functioning. However, a smoothly functioning society is not necessarily a good one. Stage 5 respondents basically believe that a good society is best conceived as a social contract into which people freely enter to work toward the benefit of all They recognize that different social groups within a society will have different values, but they believe that all rational people would agree on two points.

Stage 6: Universal Principles. Stage 5 respondents are working toward a conception of the good society. They suggest that we need to (a) protect certain individual rights and (b) settle disputes through democratic processes. Theoretically, one issue that distinguishes stage 5 from stage 6 is civil disobedience.

Now, I realize that is a lot of heavy stuff for an early Tuesday morning, but I have a few simple points to make. First of all, did you notice what stage one consists of? It consists of the one thing that kids with FASD cannot do. Their brains do not allow them to make a connection between action and consequence. So I'm wondering if that very beginning moral stage is impossible for them.

The next thought I have is that most adoptive parents are at least at Stage 4, if not 5 or 6 or we would not take on the responsibility of raising "other people's children" as the naysayers of adoption would call them. And thus the frustration as our kids, as they are growing up, live at stage one or two while we are viewing them from stage 5 or 6 is profoundly frustrating.

Bart read to be from a book called "Everything Belongs" by Richard Rohr that spartked on my thoughts. Rohr said this,

"‘Lawrence Kohlberg wrote some excellent material on levels of moral development… Jesus… is a sixth-level person. Many people have not done their first-, second- and third-level work… They’re really not bad-willed; they just can’t understand a higher, more complex moral understanding…

‘Our first response to anyone calling us to truth, greatness, goodness or morality at a higher level will be *increased anxiety*. We don’t say “Isn’t this wonderful.” Instead we recoil in terror and say, “I don’t know if I want to go there.” At the edges of medieval maps was frequently penciled the warning: “Here be dragons”. We approach these dragons when we approach the edge of our comfort level. “He must be wrong. That’s not true”. That’s our usual response when we’re called to a higher level…

So the whole dynamic works both ways. We as parents are frustrated that our children are stuck at level one or pre-level one. We want them to consider our needs, our wishes, our feelings -- or if not ours, at least those of their siblings, peers, teachers, etc. But they simply cannot.

And as we by our example and words try to "call them to a higher level of morality" they cannot understand or comprehend what we are asking them to. They see us as threatening and they become anxious and they "recoil in terror."

I don't have answers... but I am seeing a definite struggle here between what I want for my children and their ability to move beyond the very basic levels of moral development. I won't name names but I would say that at least half of the kids and young adults in our family have never made it past level one.

Maybe this is why they look at me with such strange expressions on their faces when I ask them if they have ever considered how someone else feels about something they've said or done.

Interesting stuff, huh? Think it would make a good seminar?