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The Understanding of Morality, Convention, and Personal Preference in an African Setting

Findings from Zambia

University of Namibia

Forty-three Zambian secondary school teachers and 121 of their students were interviewed to examine distinctions between direct moral, belief-mediated moral, social-conventional, and personal events. Additionally, 17 Zambian villagers and 15 American college students made judgments about a belief-mediated moral event Two main predictions were made: Zambian secondary school teachers and students would make distinctions between the four types of events, and subjects' understanding of belief-mediated moral and social-conventional transgressions would be patterned by sociocultural orientations. These predictions were confirmed. Discussed and deduced from the results is the proposition that as applied to individuals per se the concepts of unfairness, harm, justice, violation of human rights, and obligation form an insufficient basis for morality. A collective sense of well-being should, in addition, be part of this foundation.

Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, Vol. 25, No. 3, 369-393 (1994)
DOI: 10.1177/0022022194253005


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