Morality and Criminal Behavior: Kohlberg, SAT, and Moral Choices

Psychologist Lawrence Kohlberg developed a theory of how people's moral thinking develops during childhood and adolescence. The theory builds on ideas from Jean Piaget about how children's thinking develops. Kohlberg argued that our ability to reason about right and wrong changes over time and can be described as a ladder made up of three levels and six stages.

Moral development and crime

Kohlberg argued that people usually develop upward through the moral ladder, but that not everyone reaches the higher levels. Adults too may reason at the lower levels, where self-interest or fear of punishment guides their decisions.

Several studies have shown that juvenile offenders, on average, reason at lower levels of the moral ladder than youths who do not commit crime. This has been interpreted to mean that a weaker ability to reason morally may increase the risk of criminal behavior. At the same time, both Kohlberg's ladder and the interpretations linking weak morality to criminal behavior have been criticized. Researchers emphasize that criminality is also influenced by many other factors, such as environment, upbringing, and the social situation in which the individual lives.

Situational Action Theory

Situational Action Theory, often shortened to SAT, sees crime as moral action arising in specific situations. According to the theory, people weigh different courses of action against their moral views of what is right and wrong.

If a person commits a crime, it is often because the act is perceived in that specific situation as a possible or acceptable course of action. This may, for example, be the case when the temptation is strong and there are no clear consequences or risks that discourage the act.

In other situations, a person may actually think the act is wrong but still commit the crime because they are influenced by strong external factors, such as peer pressure, provocation, or other incentives. If self-control is weak, it may then become difficult to resist the temptation even though the act conflicts with the person's own values.

When a person encounters a temptation or a provocation, for example the opportunity to steal something, send a hateful message, or react aggressively, it is that person's moral values and interpretation of the situation that determine whether the act is seen as a possible alternative or not. Most people normally do not see such actions as an option, while others may do so in certain situations.

This does not mean that people who commit crime lack morality. All people have moral views, but they may differ in which rules they think are important and how serious certain actions are considered to be. Sometimes, for example, a person may think that a criminal act is justified if they feel they have been treated unfairly.

In some cases, people break laws because they do not agree with them. An act may then be illegal while still being experienced as morally right by the person who carries it out. One example is laws in certain countries that restrict how political events may be described. In Russia, for example, it has at times been forbidden to call the war in Ukraine a war. People who still do so break the law, but may at the same time feel that they are acting morally right by telling the truth.

Research therefore suggests that criminal behavior often has more to do with how people interpret a situation and which moral rules they see as important than with a complete absence of morality. Moral values, personal beliefs, and the way a person reasons about right and wrong can therefore influence whether that person follows or breaks the law.