Walden University Cognitive and Moral Development Readings Paper

To prepare:Review the ASC Success Strategies: Critical Thinking Skills video resource listed in the
Learning Resources.
Post a response to the following:
•
Identify a specific theory of cognitive or moral development, and in 2–3 sentences
summarize the major assumptions.
•
Analyze the extent to which the theory is consistent with a social perspective by
providing three specific examples in the theory’s assumptions. You might want to
consider some of the following questions to critically evaluate the theory. (Note: You do
not need to address every question below in your post. Rather, use these questions to
inform the examples you provide.)
o
How did the socio-historical context influence the development of the theory?
o
Are there constructs that reflect a deficit approach?
o
To what extent do the constructs promote growth and change?
o
Are there assumptions that end up blaming the victim?
o
Are there assumptions that pathologize certain groups individuals, families, or
communities?
o
To what extent does the theory promote self-determination and autonomy of
individuals, families, and communities?
o
To what extent does the theory foster a collaborative working relationship with
individuals, families, and communities?
o
Using one of the required media, explain how the faculty person applies theory in
the research discussed.
Required Readings
Robbins, S. P., Chatterjee, P., Canda, E. R., & Leibowitz, G. S. (2019). Contemporary human
behavior theory: A critical perspective for social work (4th ed.). Pearson.
•
Chapter 9, “Theories of Cognitive and Moral Development”
•
Chapter 14, “Application of Theories” (Note: Focus on the information in this chapter
that is related to cognitive and moral development theories.)
Kotcherlakota, S., Zimmerman, L., & Berger, A. M. (2013). Developing scholarly thinking using
mind maps in graduate nursing education. Nurse Educator, 38(6), 252–255.
doi:10.1097/01.NNE.0000435264.15495.51
Davies, M. (2011). Concept mapping, mind mapping and argument mapping: What are the
differences and do they matter? Higher Education, 62(3), 279–301.
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10734-010-9387-6
Walden University Academic Skills Center. (2020). ASC success strategies: Critical thinking
skills [Multimedia]. https://academicguides.waldenu.edu/academic-skills-center/skills/criticalthinking
Required Media
Walden University. (2018). Research foundations to dissertation: Dr. Alice Yick [Video].
Walden University Blackboard. https://class.waldenu.edu
Note: Click on this link to access the landing page for the research foundations videos, and then
watch the video “Alice Yick, PhD.” The approximate length of this media piece is 4
minutes.Walden University. (2018). Research foundations to dissertation: Dr. Pete
Meagher [Video]. Walden University Blackboard. https://class.waldenu.edu
Note: Click on this link to access the landing page for the research foundations videos, and then
watch the video “Pete Meagher, PhD.” The approximate length of this media piece is 9 minutes.
Research Foundations to Dissertation: Alice Yick, PhD
Research Foundations to Dissertation: Alice Yick, PhD
Program Transcript
[MUSIC PLAYING]
ALICE YICK: I got into social work in a very indirect route, through advertising. I
was working on M&M Mars and I was working on a Snickers’ campaign. And at
2:00 in the morning, I asked myself, why am I doing this? How am I contributing
back to the world? And I couldn’t answer that question.
So I went back to my first love, which was psychology and social work. My
research interests lie in the area of culture, race, and ethnicity, and how that
impacts mental health and domestic violence. For example, how does culture
impact on immigrants’ help seeking behaviors.
My dissertation topic was on Chinese-Americans and immigrants’ attitudes and
experiences with domestic violence. And I looked at how acculturation, attitudes
towards women, and socio-demographic factors influence their attitudes and
experiences with domestic violence. And I use a quantitative telephone survey
design. And it had a total of 263 respondents in the study.
In my dissertation study, I had two variables in my research questions:
acculturation and attitudes towards women. And they were consistent with the
two theories that I used. The first theory was acculturation theory. And I chose
this theory because the sociological literature talked about how immigrants who
experience high acculturative stress would also experience higher incidences of
domestic violence.
I also chose patriarchy theory because the feminist literature talked about how
patriarchal attitudes affected attitudes towards domestic violence, which then
promoted domestic violence.
The epistemological underpinning of my dissertation study was logical positivism.
I assume ontologically that all phenomenon in my dissertation study could be
measured and quantified. For example, domestic violence, perpetration, and
victimization experiences could be quantified and measured. And, therefore, I
use the conflict tactic scale developed by Murray Straus.
I also assume that attitudes towards women could be quantified and measured.
And so I used a Spence and Helmreich 25-item instrument. And it measured
respondents’ level of egalitarian or patriarchal attitudes towards women.
Axiologically, I assumed by using these instruments that yielded a numerical
score on acculturation, on attitudes towards women, on experiences with
domestic violence that I would be able to remove all my biases from the study.
© 2018 Laureate Education, Inc.
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Research Foundations to Dissertation: Alice Yick, PhD
In my dissertation study, because I assumed that everything could be quantified
and measured, I use a quantitative survey design. All these assumptions– the
ontological, the axiological, and the methodological assumptions– are consistent
with logical positivism.
What I recommend to doctoral students in social work is to play around with their
dissertation or the DSW Capstone topic early on through their coursework. For
example, when I was in school, when I had to take my policy class, I wrote about
domestic violence policies. When I took my research evaluation course, for one
of my assignments I proposed an evaluation study on the effectiveness of a
domestic violence program.
And if students take this route, they begin to play along with their topic early on.
And they begin to see if this is the right fit for them. And then, more importantly,
they get to know the literature. And that’s so important.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
Research Foundations to Dissertation: Alice Yick, PhD
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Images
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Research Foundations to Dissertation: Alice Yick, PhD
MUSIC:
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Credit: Studio Cutz
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Research Foundations to Dissertation: Pete Meagher, PhD
Research Foundations to Dissertation: Pete Meagher, PhD
Program Transcript
[MUSIC PLAYING]
PETE MEAGHER: I caught fire with social work, social issues, social justice in
college. Started working in a homeless youth shelter and then ended up just
loving the profession and wanting to jump in feet first. And I went and got my
master’s degree and have been in social work ever since.
My research interests include self-compassion, violence prevention, and
restorative justice. So the topic of my dissertation was restorative justice. The
goal of the study was to understand the impact of restorative justice on the
participants in the process. And the overarching design was, I used a
phenomenological approach to study participants in restorative justice processes.
My study was informed by moral development theory. And moral development
theory holds that moral judgment evolves through a context. And it’s impacted– it
develops in stages. And it’s impacted by perspective taking.
I designed my study to understand if elements of moral development were
present in the restorative processes. So I looked at perspective taking, the ability
to understand the perspective of another. And I aligned my specific questions to
get at that particular aspect of the participant’s experience.
The literature holds that perspective taking, or the development of empathy,
helps to promote moral development. How did they understand how the process
impacted their understanding of others and their actions, their impact on others?
So if it was somebody who had punched another person, did they understand
how that person was impacted by the punch? If they had a loud party, did they
understand how their neighbors were impacted by that party? If they stole
something from someone else, did they have a sense of how that impacted other
people?
The moral development theory holds that perspective taking is important in the
development of moral judgment. So my study was designed to look at how the
development and impact of perspective taking, if that was present, and if it
seemed to impact the outcomes of the processes.
And the research tradition was phenomenology or qualitative research. But
beneath that is the idea of social constructivism. Social constructivism holds that
that meaning is created in a context. And it’s created through relationships. It
really made most sense to me that to understand restorative justice– restorative
justice is a very relational kind of intervention. And so for me to understand it, I
chose a methodology that was relational in nature, that meaning was created as
© 2018 Laureate Education, Inc.
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Research Foundations to Dissertation: Pete Meagher, PhD
a part of the context of the study and to understand the event that that took
place.
Ontological assumptions underneath social constructivism– so ontology is the
nature of meaning. And there’s sort of two broad branches of it. It could be
defined and measurable or contextual. And in my study, the theoretical
underpinning was socially constructed. It was understood through relationship
and through connection to the participants.
So in my study, I interviewed participants. It wasn’t a series of 15 multiple choice
questions. It was in-depth hour-long interviews with 16 participants. And then I
took their answers and understood their responses in the context that they were
given and in relation to me and my understanding of the topic.
Social constructivism wove its way through the design of the study through
connection to the participants. As opposed to using a measured instrument or
tool, this was constructed as a result of the interviews that I conducted.
Axiological assumption refers to the nature and role of values in a study. And
again, there’s sort of two really broad pathways you can go down. You can say
that values that are taken out of this or values are front and center. And in my
study, what made the most sense to me was that I was very close to the
participants, that I got to know them, that I had a sense of what they said and
how they spoke about the topic. So the values were actually front and center.
And as a part of my process in doing this, I also talked about my own feelings
and values about the topic– my own positionality, my own context, which was
that I didn’t think it was going to work. And in fact, it did work.
The methodological assumptions are based out of a qualitative or
phenomenological background methodology was that through a series of openended exploratory questions with a given design and context, that the
participants were allowed to explore a topic in-depth. And then I, as the
researcher, analyzed their responses, sent them back to the participants. And it
was an iterative process. It wasn’t a defined, discrete use an instrument, get a
response, analyze it. It was a much more in-depth kind of back and forth process
that required there to be a relationship between myself and the participants.
The research tradition social constructivism holds that meaning is created. And
meaning is created in a context and with connection to the participants. So in this
case, I had an in-depth interview that was designed to elicit in-depth responses
on a particular topic which was the restorative justice process that they had
experienced.
The tip that I would give a student is that they align, one, a topic that they’re
passionate about that they want to spend the next year of their life living with and
© 2018 Laureate Education, Inc.
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Research Foundations to Dissertation: Pete Meagher, PhD
something that really is going to catch fire with them. And usually a good
measure of something catching fire is that you’re reading about it and you can’t
stop thinking and talking about it. So you’re talking about it with your neighbor
and your friend and everyone else.
The other side of that is that you’ve got this topic that you’re passionate about.
And you have what’s called an accessible population. So you know in your own
mind that there’s a group of people who you believe you have a reasonable
chance that you could connect with fairly easily. And when I say a group,
probably on the order of 20 to 30 individuals at least who could be a part of a
study. And again, it depends on the type of research that you’re doing. If you’re
doing a focus group, if you’re doing a phenomenological study, that would be a
smaller number. If you’re trying to do a quantitative study, it would be a much
larger number. But the accessible population is going to be key for you in the
end.
I believe the next applicable step is that you use every chance– once you’ve got
your topic that you’ve chosen that you’re passionate about, you use every
chance in your course work to explore that topic. Continue to stretch and look at
and explore that topic within the context of your course work. That’s where I
would go and do it.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
Research Foundations to Dissertation: Pete Meagher, PhD
Additional Content Attribution
FOOTAGE:
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Research Foundations to Dissertation: Pete Meagher, PhD
GettyLicense_108878439 (Small group)
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MUSIC:
SC_Light&Bright06_T32 and/or SC_Business01_T41
Credit: Studio Cutz
© 2018 Laureate Education, Inc.
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