Social Reasoning in IJO Children and Adolescents in Nigerian Communities

Abstract

The study examined moral judgments and concepts of social convention in Ijo communities located in the Niger Delta areas of Southern Nigeria. The main data analyses were based on responses from 46 subjects divided into three age groups: 8-11 years, 12-14 years, and 15-18 years (preliminary data were also obtained in a small village). Assessments were made of judgments about examples of a moral transgression and a breach of social convention. The examples used were based on pretesting for issues relevant to the community. With regard to each type of issue, subjects were asked to evaluate transgressions, provide explanations for their evaluations, and the extent to which punishment should be administered to the transgressors. Subjects were also posed with questions pertaining to the origins and alterability of rules, and authority jurisdiction over the rules. The findings showed differences in subjects' conceptual orientations to moral and conventional issues. Age differences were also found, mainly between the children and adolescents, in the patterns of responses to the various dimensions assessed. The findings indicate that two social conceptual orientations coexist in the Nigerian communities.