Moral development refers to the way in which we as individuals formulate a sense of morality as we develop as human beings. We aren't born with the ability to think in an ethical manner: a baby cries for attention when he or she needs something and it is irrelevant to that baby if someone else has needs. The baby is unaware of others. As young children, our worlds begin to expand to include our families and others who come into our immediate world. Eventually, as fully developed adults we have the capacity to consider others whose lives may never even touch ours directly.
American psychologist Lawrence Kohlberg, who did most of his work in the 1960s, examined children's responses to ethical dilemmas and developed a theory about how we develop as moral individuals. Figure 7.2 summarizes his descriptions of three levels and six stages of moral development.