In recent years, it has become increasingly important to understand diversity in people and to be able to cooperate with people who differ in many aspects of personality and behavior. A number of psychological studies have shown that understanding diversity may require development of relativism and tolerance. The present study examined how these two develop during childhood, especially focusing on situations of moral-dilemma. The study also proposes a pedagogical approach to promoting children’s development of higher level understanding of diversity in moral education. In Study 1, 1st- to 6th-grade children (n = 440) were asked to read some moral-dilemma stories and to give their opinions. Then they were exposed to some opinions and were asked to rate their views about the correctness (measure of relativism) and acceptability (measure of tolerance) of each opinion. The results showed that except for the 6th-grade children, levels of relativism and tolerance were consistently lower when the opinions they were exposed to were different from their own (compared to when they were the same). Levels of tolerance of the 6th-graders did not significantly differ according to the difference in opinions. In Study 2, 33 6th-grade children attended a class that was designed to improve their thinking skills in guessing others’ sense of values, emphasizing that there is no superiority or inferiority between such values. After the class, their attitudes toward others’ sense of values when they faced opposing opinions evidenced significant improvement, and their scores on relativism also showed partial improvement. Implications of these findings for both psychological research and the provision of moral education are discussed.
児童期における多様性理解： 発達的検討と理解を促す実践の開発
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