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authority is refuted by Kohlberg’s research. Kohlberg et al (1975) found that parents,
teachers, and church leaders are only partly influential, with peers at least as important
as adults in influencing moral development. Their research also demonstrates that
children who belong to families and other groups where there was moral discussion and
dialogue, took responsibility for decisions and were more advanced in their moral
development (Kohlberg et al, 1975). These findings suggest that the role of moral
values in decision making may be influenced by complex social and cultural systems
which impart, support and sustain their use. For example, if a child is taught to always
play fair at home and at school, then the value of fairness may be more likely to be
instrumental in the child’s decision making both in her home and school environment.
Conversely, if the child’s school environment does not support and teach fairness, that
value is less likely to be instrumental at school.
Context appears to be influential on the function and instrumentality of values.
Kohlberg’s work with prisoners supports this view. Kohlberg, Scharf and Hickey
(1973) found that the moral values that prisoners used to solve dilemmas in prison was
of a standard much lower than that used for non-prison dilemmas. Perceptions about
what should be done inside the prison were different and of a “lower moral order” than
what should be done outside of the prison (Kohlberg et al, 1973). Their research also
found that exploitative peer culture and the prison authority system encouraged
judgment more consistent with primitive reasoning in decision making about action.
The social environment of the prison was directly influential on the values employed by
prisoners in their decision making in that context.
Professional and institutional values
The societies and cultures that we grow up in and are part of can impart, support and
sustain our values. The environments in which we work, and the professions we
occupy, must also then be influential on the role and instrumentality of our values. For
example, Paul (2000) proposes that there is a clear distinction between internal and
external morality in health care. Internal morality arises from within a community of
practitioners based on how one should behave in one’s daily work, which are shared
and learnt from one another. External morality, conversely, is the view from the
outside, reflecting the ethos of wider society (Paul, 2000). The idea of internal and
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