How do genetic and environmental factors work together to influence emotional and moral development? What can parents do to ensure healthy emotional and moral development with their children? This week you’re going on a field trip – an internet field trip! Please do a search online for a current event that relates to the material in the reading this week. Give a brief summary of what you found and explain how it fits in with what you learned this week. Don’t forget to cite your source!    Emotional Development and Moral Development This week we will explore the functions of emotions, the development of emotional expression and emotional understanding, the role of temperament, and the development and significance of attachment. Additionally, we will study moral development. Topics involving moral development will include the study of morality as the adoption of societal norms, morality as social understanding, moral reasoning of young children, the development of self-control, and the development of aggression. Topics to be covered include: Stages of Emotional Development Moral Development Emotional Development Emotion is defined as a rapid appraisal of the personal significance of a situation that prepares us for action. When you experience something that is personally relevant, there is physiological response in your body that causes a behavioral response. If you get into an argument, someone you love smiles at you, or you accomplish a challenging task, you feel a surge of emotion. Your behavioral responses to your emotions is part of what makes you unique! EMOTIONS DEFINED Theorists with a functionalist approach to emotion believe that emotions play an integral role in cognitive processing, social behavior, and physical health. They believe that the purpose of emotions is to motivate behavior aimed at accomplishing personal goals. If you have a goal in mind, the anticipation of the outcome, as well as the outcome itself, triggers emotions that help dictate your response. As an individual interacts with his or her environment and situations change, emotions change. We see how cognition and emotions work together when we consider the impact of anxiety on performance. When anxiety levels rise, thinking skills are often impacted, as attention given to mental processing is now occupied with thoughts of worry. In addition, children who become distressed tend to better recall that particular experience, showing emotion is linked to memory. We also previously learned that two childhood growth disorders, nonorganic failure to thrive and psychosocial dwarfism, result from emotional deprivation. SOCIAL SITUATIONS SELF-AWARENESS HEALTH Emotional Expression The progression of emotional expression occurs with age. In early infancy, happiness is displayed through smiles and laughter, often as a reaction to parental affection or the achievement of sensorimotor goals. Infants also begin to experience anger (as a result of not being able ...

1. How do genetic and environmental factors work together to
influence emotional and moral development? What can parents
do to ensure healthy emotional and moral development with
their children?
This week you’re going on a field trip – an internet field trip!
Please do a search online for a current event that relates to the
material in the reading this week. Give a brief summary of what
you found and explain how it fits in with what you learned this
week. Don’t forget to cite your source!
Emotional Development and Moral Development
This week we will explore the functions of emotions, the
development of emotional expression and emotional
understanding, the role of temperament, and the development
and significance of attachment. Additionally, we will study
moral development. Topics involving moral development will
include the study of morality as the adoption of societal norms,
morality as social understanding, moral reasoning of young
children, the development of self-control, and the development
of aggression.
Topics to be covered include:
Stages of Emotional Development
Moral Development

2. Emotional Development
Emotion is defined as a rapid appraisal of the personal
significance of a situation that prepares us for action. When you
experience something that is personally relevant, there is
physiological response in your body that causes a behavioral
response. If you get into an argument, someone you love smiles
at you, or you accomplish a challenging task, you feel a surge
of emotion. Your behavioral responses to your emotions is part
of what makes you unique!
EMOTIONS DEFINED
Theorists with a functionalist approach to emotion believe that
emotions play an integral role in cognitive processing, social
behavior, and physical health. They believe that the purpose of
emotions is to motivate behavior aimed at accomplishing
personal goals. If you have a goal in mind, the anticipation of
the outcome, as well as the outcome itself, triggers emotions
that help dictate your response. As an individual interacts with
his or her environment and situations change, emotions change.
We see how cognition and emotions work together when we
consider the impact of anxiety on performance. When anxiety
levels rise, thinking skills are often impacted, as attention given
to mental processing is now occupied with thoughts of worry. In
addition, children who become distressed tend to better recall
that particular experience, showing emotion is linked to
memory. We also previously learned that two childhood growth
disorders, nonorganic failure to thrive and psychosocial
dwarfism, result from emotional deprivation.
SOCIAL SITUATIONS
SELF-AWARENESS

3. HEALTH
Emotional Expression
The progression of emotional expression occurs with age. In
early infancy, happiness is displayed through smiles and
laughter, often as a reaction to parental affection or the
achievement of sensorimotor goals. Infants also begin to
experience anger (as a result of not being able to control their
surroundings as expected) and fear (typically as a result of
being around unfamiliar adults). Angry reactions increase with
age into the second year, which motivates caregivers to ease the
baby’s distress. Fear, on the other hand, arises in the second
half of the first year but eventually decreases. The initial rise in
fear also keeps traveling babies safer when exploring their
environment.
SELF-CONSCIOUS EMOTIONS
Toddlers begin to display higher-order, self-conscious
emotions, such as guilt, shame, embarrassment, envy, and pride
as they grow in self-awareness. These types of emotions involve
injury to our sense of self and begin to appear at the end of the
second year. Learning to manage these emotions comes with the
support of adults, whose feedback encourages or discourages
the emotions in specific settings and situations. This, again,
varies widely from culture to culture. As emotional management
develops, young children become increasingly sensitive to
praise or blame from caregivers and emotions become
associated with self-evaluation. How adults handle feedback is
important to a child’s developing self-esteem.
Self-Regulation of Emotions

4. Over time, children must learn to control their own emotions
and emotional responses, a concept known as emotional self-
regulation. The ability to adjust an emotional state depends on
several cognitive strategies, including attention focusing and
shifting, inhibiting certain thoughts and behaviors, and making
a plan to relieve stress. This regulation is influenced by both
adult instruction and cultural expectations and is an important
part of adapting to the physical and social environment in which
a child is raised.
INFANCY
EARLY CHILDHOOD
MIDDLE CHILDHOOD
In infancy, babies mainly use social referencing to evaluate
situations. In other words, they observe how others react to
determine if a situation is positive or negative. Babies learn to
turn away from unpleasant situations or engage in self-soothing
strategies when upset. Sympathetic rather than impatient
parental responses make babies easier to soothe and encourage
self-calming strategies.
TEMPERAMENT‹
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Temperament is defined as early-appearing, stable individual
differences in reactivity and self-regulation. Both temperament
and parenting play a role in the development and expression of
empathy. It makes sense that children who are friendly,
confident, and successful at self-regulation are more likely to

5. empathize with others than children who are antagonistic and
struggle with regulation of emotions.
Let’s review some models and influences of temperament.
Attachment
Attachment is the strong affectionate tie that develops between
infants and the familiar people who respond to their needs.
Infants grow attached to those around them who give them what
they need. Bowlby’s ethological theory of attachment
recognizes the infant’s emotional tie to the caregiver as an
evolved response that promotes survival. He also proposed that
the quality of this attachment affects the child’s long-term
emotions and ability to form trusting relationships. As
attachment develops, we observe babies displaying separation
anxiety when the primary caregiver leaves. Children, on the
other hand, depend less on the physical proximity of caregivers
because they are aware of the emotional bond even during
separation. Instead, an image of the caregiver serves as an
internal working model, which becomes a vital part of the
child’s personality, guiding future close relationships. An
internal working model is a set of expectations about the
availability of attachment figures, their likelihood of providing
support during times of stress, and the self’s interaction with
those figures.
Through Mary Ainsworth’s Strange Situation technique (an
experiment that takes the baby through eight short episodes in
which brief separations from and reunions with the caregiver
occur) and other tools for measuring the quality of infant
attachment, researchers have identified a secure attachment
pattern and several patterns of insecurity (avoidant, resistant,
and disorganized/disoriented).

6. Attachment security is influenced by several factors, including
opportunity for attachment, quality of caregiving, infant
characteristics, family circumstances, and the parents’ own
internal working models. Sensitive caregiving by fathers,
similar to mothers, predicts secure attachment; however,
typically mothers devote more time to care and affection, while
fathers are more prone to playful interaction. The evidence
regarding the relationship between secure attachment in infancy
and later cognitive, emotional, and social competence is
contradictory, but steadiness of caregiving seems to be a
significant element in this relationship. As we continue to see a
shift towards more mothers entering the workforce, we begin to
look at quality of care beyond that of the parent-child
relationship. Evidence suggests that quality of care is critically
important. Standards for developmentally appropriate child care
exist, but the United States and Canada both fall behind
European nations in providing child care that is nationally
regulated and adequately funded.
AVOIDANT
RESISTANT
DISORGANIZED/DISORIENTED
Knowledge Check
1
Question 1
Which is a strategy used by children in order to gather
emotional information from a trusted person in an uncertain
situation?Emotion-centered copingInternal working
modelProblem-centered copingSocial referencingI don't know
One attempt

7. Submit answer
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Case Study
Analyzing research studies in the area of emotional
development can assist in understanding of key concepts of
emotions. The first case study illustrates the effects of early and
later maternal sensitivity on children’s social development. The
second case study examines the relationship between identity
status and romantic attachment style in adolescence, including
developmental differences between younger and older
adolescents.
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STUDY 1
A Longitudinal Study of Maternal Sensitivity and Adopted
Children’s Social Development
Sensitive caregiving is moderately related in attachment
security in both biological and adoptive mother–infant pairs and
in diverse cultures and SES groups. To examine the effects of
early and later maternal sensitivity on children’s social
development, Jaffari-Bimmel and colleagues (2006) followed
160 internationally adopted children from infancy to age 14. All
of the children were placed in adoptive families by age six
months, and the families were predominantly middle- or upper-
middle class.
The researchers collected the following information:

8. When the children were five months old, their adoptive mothers
rated their health condition on arrival (that is, at the time of
adoption)—birth weight, incidence of prematurity, and health
problems.
When the children were 12 months old, attachment security was
assessed using Ainsworth’s Strange Situation.
At ages 12, 18, and 30 months, maternal sensitivity was
assessed at home and in the laboratory. While the children and
their mothers completed age-appropriate tasks like putting
together puzzles and building with blocks, trained researchers
coded for emotional support, respect for the child’s autonomy,
structure and limit setting, hostility, and quality of instruction.
At ages seven and 14 years, maternal sensitivity was again
assessed in the home. While the children and their mothers
worked on a difficult, age-appropriate puzzle, trained
researchers coded for supportive presence, intrusiveness, and
sensitivity, timing, and clarity of instruction.
When the children were ages 12, 18, and 30 months and ages
seven and 14 years, their adoptive mothers completed an
attachment questionnaire. In infancy, the researchers were
primarily interested in mood and resistance. In middle
childhood and adolescence, the researchers focused on
aggression, reactivity, and restlessness.
When children were ages seven and 14 years, adoptive mothers
and teachers completed a measure of social development. The
questionnaire focused on social acceptance, social rejection,
pro-social competence, friendliness, and social esteem.
When the children were ages seven and 14 years, their adoptive

9. mothers reported on the degree to which the family had
experienced stressful life events during the past two years. The
instrument included physical health problems of relatives,
bereavement, unemployment, divorce, financial problems,
marital problems, problems at work, and conflict with relatives
and/or neighbors.
Results
Findings indicated that developmental history and sensitive
caregiving in infancy and middle childhood predicted social
development at age 14. That is, participants who were healthy at
the time of adoption and experienced few stressful life events
and received sensitive caregiving in both infancy and middle
childhood were rated higher in social development (by adoptive
mothers and teachers) than peers who were unhealthy at the
time of adoption, experienced a large number of stressful life
events, and received less-sensitive caregiving in infancy and
middle childhood. Another important finding was that maternal
sensitivity in middle childhood and adolescence helped buffer
against the negative effects of a difficult temperament. Children
with a difficult temperament who experienced high levels of
maternal sensitivity in middle childhood and adolescence had
more favorable social development at age 14 than children with
a difficult temperament who experienced insensitive caregiving.
Finally, consistent with previous studies, attachment security in
infancy was moderately related to social development at ages
seven and 14. Compared to their insecurely attached
counterparts, secure children scored higher in social acceptance,
pro-social competence, friendliness, and social esteem. Taken
together, these findings show that both early and later maternal
sensitivity is important for children’s social development.

10. Morality
All cultures promote morality through a predominant social
design that stipulates rules for proper conduct. Morality
includes emotional, cognitive, and behavioral components, as
people think and feel morally significant thoughts, but may or
may not act in accordance with them. Truly moral individuals
have developed compassionate concerns and ideals of good
conduct.
PERSPECTIVES ON MORALITY
PSYCHOANALYTIC PERSPECTIVE
SOCIAL LEARNING PERSPECTIVE
COGNITIVE-DEVELOPMENTAL PERSPECTIVE
Let us consider the biological perspective on morality. Morality
is grounded in our genetic heritage, perhaps through pre-wired
emotional reactions. Ethologists have found evidence that
ethical behaviors are rooted in our evolutionary history. We
share many morally relevant behaviors with other species, as
many animals have been observed instinctively coming to the
aid of other animals, particularly those within their species or
family groups. In humans, areas within the prefrontal cortex are
vital for emotional sensitivity to the distress of others. Adults
with damage to this area of the brain have difficulty reacting
with empathy or following social models for morality. However,
we must look beyond human nature and consider that many self-
conscious emotions develop out of the support of loving
caregivers and advanced cognitive development.
Theories for Morality as Social Understanding

11. You may recall learning about Piaget’s stages of cognitive
development. His work on moral development is based in his
cognitive theory. Piaget proposed that young children
experience two general stages of moral development.
HETERONOMOUS MORALITY
MORALITY OF COOPERATION
Children between the ages of five and eight years of age exhibit
heteronomous morality, viewing rules handed down by
authorities as permanent and unchangeable. This rigid need to
follow the rules shows limited moral understanding, as rules are
viewed as absolutes rather than principles that can be modified
depending on the situation.
Although many agree with Piaget’s assumption that moral
development is reinforced by cognitive maturity, gradual
release from adult control, and peer interaction, critics of
Piaget’s theory believe he underestimated the moral capacities
of children, as children even as young as age four can recognize
the difference between morally relevant, conflicting behaviors
(e.g., truthfulness and lying). Furthermore, children do not
regard adult authority with the absolute obedience he suggested.
Even children as young as three and four express unease at the
idea of harming someone at an adult’s command. Finally, it has
been noted that many children exhibit both types of morality at
the same time, making researchers view moral development as
more of a prolonged process.
Kohlberg’s Theory of Moral Development
This brings us to Kohlberg’s six-stage sequence, which extends

12. Piaget’s stages beyond morality of cooperation. He viewed
moral development as more of a gradual process which ranges
from childhood into adulthood and used Moral Judgment
Interviews to examine how individuals resolve hypothetical
moral dilemmas. Kohlberg accentuated that it is the way one
reasons about the predicament, not the actual decision that make
about it, that determines maturity of moral judgment.
His six stages of moral reasoning are organized into three
general levels: preconventional, conventional, and
postconventional. He considered these universal stages as
occurring in a fixed order. Moral change occurs and moral
decisions become more logical as individuals build on their
reasoning skills from each previous stage. Progress through the
stages is gradual.
Challenges to Kohlberg’s theory include that his stages are too
loosely organized, which causes them to overlap. Also, the
dilemmas presented to individuals are hypothetical and not real.
In a real situation, people’s responses may differ. Kohlberg’s
theory has also been challenged on the grounds that it
underestimates the moral maturity of females because it
undervalues an “ethic of care” more often seen in women and
that his research was conducted using only boys. Finally, few
individuals are capable of reaching Kohlberg’s highest stage
and that postconventional morality should not be considered the
only standard of maturity in moral reasoning.
PRECONVENTIONAL LEVEL
CONVENTIONAL LEVEL
POSTCONVENTIONAL LEVEL
Influences on Moral Reasoning

13. Moral understanding, like many areas of development, is
influenced by a variety of factors. These include personality,
child-rearing practices, schooling, peer interaction, and culture.
These factors work together to support the development of
perspective-taking and provide opportunities for children to
think about moral problems in many ways. It makes sense to
consider that, as these factors influence moral reasoning, the
resulting increase causes moral behavior. However, moral
behavior does not always follow from moral understanding but
is affected by other factors, including moral self-relevance—the
degree to which morality is central to self-concept. When
morals are an integral part of an individual’s identity, he or she
is more likely to follow through on moral judgments. Parents
and teachers who promote empathy and guide children to take
responsibility for others and solve disputes in a courteous
manner contribute to moral action. In addition, adolescents who
remain part of a religious community are typically advantaged
over nonaffiliated youths in moral values and behavior,
although involvement in religious cults is an exception.
SELF-CONTROL AND AGGRESSION‹
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We have previously learned about effortful control, or the
extent to which children can manage their reactivity, in relation
to emotions. As children progress through moral development,
an important aspect for positive growth is self-control. Self-
control depends on the ability to resist temptation, which
children begin to develop in the second year, as they progress in
their abilities to both direct their own actions and carefully
apply the directives of others.
Knowledge Check

14. 1
Question 1
Which perspective on morality suggests that morals are attained
mainly through modeling and reinforcement?Psychoanalytic
perspectiveSocial learning perspectiveBiological perspectiveI
don't know
One attempt
Submit answer
You answered 0 out of 0 correctly. Asking up to 1.
Overview
Emotion is the rapid appraisal of the personal significance of a
situation that prepares us for action. Theorists with a
functionalist approach to emotion believe that emotions play an
integral role in cognitive processing, social behavior, and
physical health. They believe that the purpose of emotions is to
motivate behavior aimed at accomplishing personal goals.
Through the process of social referencing, children learn how to
act in certain situations. The progression of emotional
expression occurs with age, and, over time, children must learn
to control their own emotions and emotional responses using
self-regulation strategies. By middle childhood and early
adolescence, children greatly improve at regulating emotions, as
their strategies become more adaptable and refined.
All cultures promote morality through a predominant social
design that stipulates rules for proper conduct. Morality
includes emotional, cognitive, and behavioral components, as
people think and feel morally significant thoughts, but may or
may not act in accordance with them. Children begin to develop
a moral identity, or an individual’s endorsement of moral
values, such as fairness, kindness, and generosity, as central to

15. his or her self-concept. Moral understanding, like many areas of
development, is influenced by a variety of factors. These
include personality, child-rearing practices, schooling, peer
interaction, and culture. These factors work together to support
the development of perspective-taking and provide opportunities
for children to think about moral problems in many ways. As
children progress through moral development, an important
aspect for positive growth is self-control. As metacognition
increases, children become better at devising strategies for
resisting temptation and self-control becomes a flexible
capacity for moral self-regulation.
Key Terms
ETHOLOGICAL THEORY OF ATTACHMENT
EFFORTFUL CONTROL
EMOTION
EMOTION-CENTERED COPING
EMOTIONAL SELF-REGULATION
EMPATHY
FUNCTIONALIST APPROACH TO EMOTION
GOODNESS-OF-FIT MODEL
INTERNAL WORKING MODEL
SELF-CONSCIOUS EMOTIONS
SOCIAL REFERENCING

16. STRANGE SITUATION
SYMPATHY
TEMPERAMENT
COMPLIANCE
CONSTRUCTION
CONVENTIONAL LEVEL
DELAY OF GRATIFICATION
HETERONOMOUS MORALITY
INDUCTION
INTERNALIZATION
MORAL IDENTITY
MORALITY OF COOPERATION
POSTCONVENTIONAL LEVEL
PRECONVENTIONAL LEVEL
PROACTIVE AGGRESSION
REACTIVE AGGRESSION