engleski

Moral reasoning of prisoners

In order to test concurrent validity of Test of Moral Reasoning, which is a relatively new instrument, we applied this test on prison sample of participants and compared their result with results of non-prisoner sample. The sample of prisoners included 98 participants (34 women), an average age of 40 years. Participants were categorized by the criminal act they committed-crime against health/life (n = 42) and crime against property (n = 56). Control sample included 222 participants equivalent in gender and level of education for which there was no evidence of criminal acts. All participants took Test of Moral Reasoning. We compared parameters of moral reasoning between prisoners and control sample (IMR-index of moral reasoning, rough measures of CO- conservative orientation and HO-humanistic orientation and six Kohlberg’s phases of moral reasoning). Results showed that group of prisoners had a lower level of IMR. Beside the second level of pre-conventional phase, which is characterized with a higher result of prisoner´s group, in all other phases control sample had higher results, except the first phase on which two samples did not differ. In accordance with changes in phases, the level of CO was lower and the level of HO was higher in the sample of prisoners. This result means that prisoners were more prone to justify the act of steal in moral dilemma based on which these parameters were calculated. Differences in parameters of moral reasoning between two groups of prisoners will be discussed. Obtained results support the validity of the Test of Moral Reasoning.

moral reasoning, prisoners, conservative orientation, humanistic orientation

nije evidentirano