Pilfold - Week 5 Discussion 2: Reflection
Zachary Jordan Pilfold
MHS 555: Lifespan Development
Concordia University, NE
Professor Durheim
Fall A 2015
October 1, 2015
When it comes to my own moral development I feel that my mother, my fellow peers, and even my own personal experiences have helped to shape who I am. According to Santrock (2014) moral development in one’s self comes down to the “feelings,” behaviors, and thoughts one has in response to what is considered right or wrong (p. 433). As a child I struggled with defining what is right and what is wrong within my own life. I can specifically remember one moment in time where my mother helped me to define what is the correct attitude and perspective to have toward people that are different from myself. You see when I was very small I found it weird when I saw someone of a different ethnicity then myself.
I judged those people and when my mom noticed that I was doing that she sat me down and had a long conversation with me. During that conversation I learned that I should never judge someone because of the way they look. Without my mother morally I would have judged people different then myself as being less or unequal compared to other people who look and act like me. Due to my mother’s actions I feel that Piaget and Kohlberg were wrong when they stated that parents don’t really help to instill moral development patterns in children because I feel my mother did instill moral development within me especially in response as to the proper way on how to deal and treat people different from myself. .
When it comes to peers I feel that my moral development was brought on by family circumstances, social activities, and communication patterns. When it comes to my own personal experience I feel that morally being placed in situations where I needed to make a decision one way or the other and thus picking one and then being rewarded or punished for it has helped me to learn and decide what is the right course of action I should take. Another really good example of this in action was when I was in elementary school and thus was doing poorly on an assignment and my friend told me to change things and he’d count it as being right. I told him no and then the teacher overheard us arguing about it so she then pulled us aside and asked what was going on and we thus explained what had happened. She told me that I was right to think that cheating was wrong and that it was good that I was honest. I never forgot that lesson and still remember it vividly even still today.
Reference
Santrock, J. W. (2014). A Topical Approach to Life-Span Development. (7th Ed.). Dallas,
Texas: McGraw-Hill