The Development Of Children’s Moral Judgement On The Damage Of Public And Private Property:Relations With School Adjustment And The Changes Of The Time

This research was taken from292children in one kindergarten and two primary schools in Shanghai. These children were in kindergarten, Grade One, Grade Three and Grade Five (Five, seven, nine and eleven years old). Through the talking about the damage of public and private property, their moral judgement could be found out. At the same time, questionnaires such as class drama were carried out in order to explore the elements which influence their moral judgement. Finally, the result of this research was compared with that in year1982. The result of the research indicated that:(1) Under the circumstance of the fixed behavior purpose, five-year-old children have already been able to make the right judgement according to the damage of public and private property. The definition of the judgement is more obvious than that of thirty years ago. Children from seven years old to nine years old can make more definite judgement on the relationship between public and private.Eleven-year-old children care more about the damage of private property.(2) Under the circumstance of the fixed damage form of public and private property, children from five years old to eleven years old can all make the right judgement according to the behavior purpose. Furthermore, this kind of judging ability formed before one is five years old.(3) Under the circumstances of the infixed damage form of public and private property and the behavior purpose, the judgement of public and private property of children from all ages give way to that of the behavior purpose.(4) When children play the roles of the ones whose private properties are damaged, part of them from five years old to nine years old will judge that comparing with the damage of public property, the damage of private property is worse. However, this kind of reverse phenomenon doesn’t occur among the children of eleven years old.(5) The children’s explanation indicate that the cognition levels of public and private sense vary among the children of different ages:changing from being afraid of being punished and obeying authority to caring for classmates and bearing collective responsibility. They are promoted step by step.(6) Among the boys of nine years old and eleven years old, their sense of protecting public property is proportion to the extent of self-esteem as well as the physical attack. Those who areinclined to judge that the intentional property damage is worse seem to have higherself-esteem.(7) The chronological effect does exist in the children’s damage of publicand private property. If the behavior purpose is fixed, contemporary children caremore about the damage of private property.