Kohlberg's Theory of Moral Development

This paper is an examination of Lawrence Kohlberg=s theory of moral development, using characters and situations from the film American Beauty (1999), directed by Sam Mendes from a script by Alan Ball. This film is filled with moral choices that show many of the earlier stages of Kohlberg=s scheme. Most of these characters have not been able to progress to the higher levels, and their individual choices have brought them into conflict with those around them and, in many cases, prevented them from being truly happy. While Kohlberg does not posit that higher levels of moral functioning have any relationship to personal happiness, he does argue that progression toward the advanced stages is desirable in aiming toward the perhaps unachievable ideal of the sixth stage of the principled conscience.

American Beauty (1999) is filled with characters facing moral choices - and almost always choosing whatever society would consider to be the immoral path. Lester Burnham is a 42-year-old man in the middle of an enormous mid-life crisis. He is estranged from his real estate agent wife, Carolyn, and his teenage daughter, Jane, who both see him as a loser. His new next-door neighbors include the straight-arrow Marine colonel, Frank Fitz, his almost catatonic wife, and their son, Ricky, a drug dealer and amateur videographer who develops a fascination with Jane.

Lester begins the story with a voice-over that announces, "In less than a year, I'll be dead" (American, 1999). The events

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ay" (p. 1). As Robert N. Barger (2000) describes it, "This level is characterized by a view that right behavior means acting in one's own best interests" (p. 1). Because Ricky's moral development has not progressed to the Conventional Level, he remains free of society's demands. The fact that he has not moved on to these stages by late adolescence and has found his own ways of functioning effectively at this Pre-conventional Level makes it unlikely that he will ever make the transition unless some significant event forces him to progress further. No such advancement is suggested by the events of the movie. His father is far more advanced morally, even though the moral choice he eventually makes is much more socially disastrous than the choices his son selects. Colonel Fitz has made it to the Second Stage of the Second Level, the place that, according to Kohlberg, most adults reach as functioning members of society. He is in the Law and Order Stage, an appropriate advancement for a USMC officer. As Kohlberg (1971) describes it, "Right behavior consists in doing one's duty, showing respect for authority, and maintaining the given social order for its own sake" (p. 2). Fitz tells his son, "You can't just go around doing what

Category: Psychology - K