¹ Merelman, Richard M., “The Development of Policy Thinking in Adolescence,” American Political Science Review, 65 (12, 1971), 1033–1047.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

² See especially Piaget, Jean, Six Psychological Studies (New York: Vintage, 1967), 69Google Scholar; and Kohlberg, Lawrence, “From Is to Ought: How to Commit the Naturalistic Fallacy and Get Away With It in the Study of Moral Development,” unpublished manuscript, p. 65.Google Scholar Manuscript prepared for Cognitive Development and Epistemology, ed. Mischel, T. (New York: Academic Press, forthcoming).Google Scholar

³ The older the adolescent, the greater the opportunity he has had to equilibrate his diverse cognitive processes. See Kohlberg, Lawrence, “Stage and Sequence: The Cognitive-Developmental Approach to the Study of Socialization,” Handbook of Socialization Theory and Research, ed. Goslin, David, (Chicago: Rand McNally, 1969), pp. 347–180.Google Scholar

⁴ See, for example, McClosky, Herbert, Hoffmann, Paul J., and O'Hara, Rosemary, “Issue Conflict and Consensus Among Party Leaders and Followers,” American Political Science Review, 54 (06, 1960), 406–427.CrossRefGoogle Scholar See also Greenstein, Fred I., Personality and Politics (Chicago: Markham, 1969), p. 54.Google Scholar

The questions used to assess degree of politicization were:

How interested would you say you were in politics? Very interested, moderately interested, not very interested (Scoring—two points for very interested, one for moderately, zero for not very).

Have you ever done any campaigning for a political candidate? Yes (three points), No (zero points).

Are you a member of any extra-curricular activities having to do with government or current affairs? Yes (two points), No (zero points).

How often do you read about politics in the newspapers Not very often (zero points). Moderately often (one point), Very often (two points).

How often do you watch the news on TV? Not very often (zero points), Moderately often (one point), Very often (two points).

Finally, we asked four questions in order to provide a score based on the respondent's level of knowledge about current political issues. A point was given for each correct answer.

The mean politicization score among the politicized respondents was 8.64; among the apathetic the mean score was 5.11. Equal numbers of eighth and twelfth graders fell in each of the two politicization categories.

⁵ See especially Converse, Philip E., “The Nature of Belief Systems in Mass Publics,” in Ideology and Discontent, ed. Apter, David E. (New York: The Free Press of Glencoe, 1964), pp. 206–261.Google Scholar A contrary view is presented by Luttbeg, Norman R. in “The Structure of Beliefs Among Leaders and the Public,” Public Opinion Quarterly, 32 (Fall, 1968), pp. 398–409.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁶ See especially Inhelder, Barbel and Piaget, Jean, The Growth of Logical Thinking from Childhood to Adolescence, trans. Parsons, Anne and Milgram, Stanley (New York: Basic Books, 1958).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁷ Maier, Henry W., Three Theories of Child Development, rev. ed. (New York: Harper and Row, 1969), p. 101.Google Scholar

⁸ Sociocentrism through cooperation is discussed as an alternative to egocentrism in Piaget, Jeanet al., The Moral Judgment of the Child, trans. Gabain, Marjorie (New York: The Free Press, 1965), p. 187.Google Scholar

⁹ The peripheral position of role talcing in our findings is quite damaging to cognitive developmental theory. Role taking has been considered by most developmental theorists to be both a primary motivator of individual growth and a central component of all cognitive structures. See especially Flavell, John H., in collaboration with Botkin, Patricia T., Fry, Charles L. Jr., Wright, John W., and Jarvis, Paul E., The Development of Role-Taking and Communication Skills in Children (New York: Wiley, 1968), pp. 4–5.Google Scholar