Hostname: page-component-6766d58669-r8qmj Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-05-17T14:59:09.445Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Children's everyday moral conversation speaks to the emergence of obligation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 April 2020

Karen Bartsch Open the ORCID record for Karen Bartsch [Opens in a new window]
Karen Bartsch*
Affiliation:
Psychology Department, Wyoming University, Laramie, WY82071-3415. bartsch@uwyo.eduhttp://www.uwyo.edu/psychology/faculty/bartsch.html
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

For Tomasello's proposed ontology of the human sense of moral obligation, observations of early moral language may provide useful evidence complementary to that afforded by experimental research. Extant reports of children's everyday moral talk reveal patterns of participation and content that accord with the proposal and hint at extensions addressing individual differences.

Information

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 43 , 2020 , e59
Check for updates
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Bartsch, K. & Wellman, H. M. (1995) Children talk about the mind. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Dunn, J. (1987) The beginnings of moral understanding: Development in the second year. In: The emergence of morality in young children, ed. Kagan, J. & Lamb, S., pp. 91–111. University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Dunn, J. & Munn, P. (1986) Siblings and the development of prosocial behavior. International Journal of Behavioral Development 9:265–84.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gräfenhain, M., Behne, T., Carpenter, M. & Tomasello, M. (2009) Young children's understanding of joint commitments. Developmental Psychology 45(5):1430–33.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
MacWhinney, B. (2000) The CHILDES project: Tools for analyzing talk, vol. 2, The database (3rd edition). Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Mamman, M., Koymen, B. & Tomasello, M. (2018) The reasons young children give to peers when explaining their judgments of moral and conventional rules. Developmental Psychology 54(2):254–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rakoczy, H., Warneken, F. & Tomasello, M. (2008) The sources of normativity: Young children's awareness of the normative structure of games. Developmental Psychology 44(3):875–81.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rekers, Y., Haun, D. & Tomasello, M. (2011) Children, but not chimpanzees, prefer to forage collaboratively. Current Biology 21:1756–58.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ross, H. & den Bak-Lammers, I. (1998) Consistency and change in children's tattling on their siblings: Children's perspectives on the moral rules and procedures in family life. Social Development 7:275–300.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wright, J. C. & Bartsch, K. (2008) Portraits of early moral sensibility in two children's everyday conversations. Merrill-Palmer Quarterly 54(1):56–85.CrossRefGoogle Scholar