Carol Gilligan's Theory of Care Ethics (explained and summarized)

The ethics of care is a theory developed by the American psychologist Carol Gilligan as a moral theory on principles of universal character in human beings with respect to the ethics of Justice.

The ethics of care for Gilligan and his collaborators is intended to argue the right to people towards the care of others and the equality of moral and ethical development between men and women.

This theory arose as an alternative to Lawrence Kohlberrg's theory of moral development of the 1980s, which will be briefly explained in the next section to get into the subject.

In turn, some arguments related to both theories will be presented, based on the impartial review of some bibliographic sources on models of moral development.

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The precedent of Kohlberg's Theory of Moral Development

The psychologist Lawrence Kohlberg developed a model of moral reasoning that was divided into six stages and three different levels, postulating that children were reaching higher moral levels as their cognitive ability increased in relation to age and education.

The experiment that Kohlberg carried out to elaborate his theory arose from the analysis that he carried out in his doctoral thesis on the theory of moral development Jean piaget. This experiment was based on the exposure of moral dilemmas to the participating subjects, having to choose between following the norms or disobey them for the benefit of another person (for example, Heinz's dilemma, which consists of posing a situation in which you must decide between stealing a medicine for a sick person, not being able to buy it, or respecting the law and that person running out of the medicine they needs to).

The different levels of moral reasoning that Kholberg raises when developing his theory will be briefly shown below.

Level I. Pre-convention morality (4-10 years)

• Stage 1. They comply with the rules to avoid being punished
• Stage 2. Take actions to receive some benefit.

Here there is an individualistic perspective, based on a principle of hedonism. Children are driven by their own interests.

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Level II. Conventional morality (10-13 years)

• Stage 3. They want to please other people who are important to them.
• Stage 4. Respect social norms in order to maintain a social order.

Here the individualistic perspective of the previous stage begins to merge into a perspective more oriented towards the good of those closest to you, like friends and family. They worry about being “good kids” and being liked by other people.

Level III. Post-conventional morality (adolescence-early adulthood)

• Stage 5. He really cares about the rights of society.
• Stage 6. Respect for universal rights.

The third level is that of authentic morality. Recognizes a conflict between two moral standards and reasons the decision to carry out one or another conduct based on the principles of justice and equality. Likewise, this model was not free from criticism, as we will see below and, among which it is worth highlighting, the model that Gilligan postulates as an alternative.

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Gilligan's Ethics of Caring

The main criticisms made of Kohlberg's model are based mainly on the fact that she did not carry out her research in real situations, but in an experimental context.

Another criticism of this study was that Kohlberg's experiment could be biased, showing results in women with intermediate levels of moral development; Unlike men, who reached the highest level of moral development in a large proportion.

It is because of these controversial findings that Carol Gilligan, who was a student of his at Harvard University and collaborating in her research, she decides to elaborate her theory of the ethics of care, to the detriment of the universalist theory of Kohlberg.

A) Yes, Carol Gilligan's ethics of care arose as a counterpart to Kohlberg's theory of moral reasoningher, who she had researched with values ​​that Gilligan argued used to be more important to men, such as following the socially established norms and not harm others, leaving aside values ​​such as the importance of caring for others persons.

However, Gilligan's research did not receive sufficient support at first and, therefore, she continued to investigate with the aim of obtaining a greater solidity in her theory.

Gilligan she wanted to investigate the way in which women made moral decisions when faced with different dilemmas. In her investigation, there were situations in which to act with morality, seeing this as a concept of responsibility against selfishness, responsibility being understood as the obligation to care for other people and not Cause damage.

After analyzing the results, Gilligan she presented the conclusion that women focus less on abstract justice and fairness, and think more about the responsibilities they have towards specific people of her surroundings.

As a result of her research, she developed her theory of moral development in women, divided into 3 levels.

Level 1. Orientation towards personal survival (preconventional)

In this first level, women focus on themselves, in what is best for them and in what serves them of some beneficial use.

Transition 1. From selfishness to responsibility

In this transition to the conventional level, they begin to be more considerate of their relationships with others, being less individualistic.

Level 2. Bondar as a form of self-sacrifice (conventional)

In this conventional stage, it is when they truly care about the care of others in a selfless way.

Transition 2. From goodness to truth

They make sure to weigh their decisions based on the consequences they might have. They develop their moral reasoning to the point of always taking into account the needs of others, without ever losing sight of their own. They begin to find a balance between self-care and caring for those close to them.

Level 3. Morality of nonviolence (postconventional)

It is the highest stage that can be reached at the level of moral reasoning, the postconventional one. By reaching this level they take responsibility for their own decisions because they are in control of their lives. It is the level where a moral balance has been established between focusing on herself and others.

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Moral development according to Gilligan

For Gilligan the greatest moral dilemma a woman had was based on the conflict you had between your needs and caring for other people.

In her model Gilligan posits that women's preferences towards caring for others as moral responsibility, is based on being responsible, to a greater extent, for the care of the newly born. The result of this is that personality characteristics can be found in all societies and cultures. women who are more ingrained to connection with other people than personality traits are usually male.

The fundamental characteristics that are extracted from Carol Gilligan's theory of the ethics of care are: care, responsibility, community, care and interdependence. The force that moves them is mutual cooperation that is carried out through skills such as empathy and the ability to sustain interpersonal relationships. This is posed like this in contrast to the ethics of justice, whose values ​​were more directed towards individuality, independence, objectivity, freedom, equality and justice, being driven by reason and compliance with the rules stipulated.

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Conclusions on Carol Gilligan's Theory of Care Ethics

By way of conclusion, it should be noted that there are investigations carried out a posteriori that did not find great differences in terms of gender with respect to moral reasoning.

113 studies were analyzed in this regard and concluded that women thought more in terms related to care, in a contextual plane; while men used to do it in terms associated with justice, situated on a more formal and abstract plane. Sentencing that the differences between both sexes were small.

Other studies performed with neuroimaging radiology techniques found that women saw greater activity brain in areas that are associated with care-based reasoning (posterior cingulum, anterior, and insula previous); while men presented greater activity in other brain areas that are associated with justice-related processing (superior temporal sulcus).

In later research, Gilligan posits that the moral development of both women and men comes to evolve beyond reasoning in abstract terms. For this reason, in her research, she used moral dilemmas applied in real situations that could arise to the people evaluated at some point in their lives.

A striking result of the experiment by Gilligan and her colleagues was that they were able to observe that many twenty-somethings were dissatisfied with their capacity for moral logic, considering that it was underdeveloped and in turn had a superior capacity to live with contradictions morals.

On the other hand, it should be noted that Gilligan's model has been quite accepted by the community of psychology of the development to be carried out in a real context, and also reflects an alternative system of values ​​with respect to the one proposed by Kohlberg. Likewise, it is noteworthy that Kohlberg added a seventh stage to his model of moral reasoning, and her model became more in accord with Gilligan's model..

The latest update to the Gilligan and Kohlberg models posits that liability with with respect to other people is the maximum level that can be reached in the development of reasoning moral. Both psychologists agree on the fundamental importance for both sexes of relationships with other people, as well as compassion and care for others.