Vahid Ahmadi a *, Iran Davoudi b, Maryam Mardani b, Maryam Ghazaei b, Bahman ZareZadegan b

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1 Available online at Procedia - Social and Behavioral Scien ce s 84 ( 2013 ) rd World Conference on Psychology, Counselling and Guidance (WCPCG-2012) The Relationships among Moral Development, Religiosity and Religious Orientation in Students Vahid Ahmadi a *, Iran Davoudi b, Maryam Mardani b, Maryam Ghazaei b, Bahman ZareZadegan b a Department of Psychology,Payame Noor University, Ilam, Iran b Department of Psychology, Shahid Chamran University, Ahvaz, Iran Abstract Morality and Religion are one of the most important dimensions in every ones life, and the level of moral development would affect on the any person's life. This study aimed at examining the relationships between level of moral development and in the students of Chamran University of Ahwaz. The sample size is 169 people and sampling method is available. Tools used in this study are Allport's questionnaire, level of moral development scale (Ma) and the religiosity scale. Results showed that between the level of moral development in attitudes and emotions (P= 0.05 near to significant, r=-0.15) for commitment to duties (P= 0.02, r=-0.17) there are negative relationships. As the results showed that there is a relationship between the level of moral development and attitudes, emotions and commitment to duties, since this relationship is negative, we can conclude that by increasing the level of morality development, with attitudes and emotions and a commitment to duties will decrease. Discussion and implications of the results are presented in the study The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. Open access under CC BY-NC-ND license. Selection 2013 Published and peer-review by Elsevier under responsibility Ltd. Selection of Prof. and Dr. peer Huseyin review Uzunboylu under the & Dr. responsibility Mukaddes Demirok, of Dr. Near Melehat East University, Halat Cyprus Keywords: moral development, religiosity,, students. Introduction The moral consequences of devout motivation has been hotly debated as academic psychology as they have been in popular culture. Gordon Allport (1950) was perhaps the bestconsequences. Religion and morality have been closely intertwined. This is true whether we go back within Greek philosophy or within Christianity and Judaism (John, 2010) since, morality, religion and religiosity are one of the most important dimensions of each person's life, and Moral development will affect the lives of every person. The morality, value behaviour, the optional attributes of humans and determine proper and improper system. Also religion is a practical system based on beliefs that has been sent in the realm of personal and social dimensions of the Lord, to guide human in growth and perfection of the divine (Nikoee & Seif, 2006). Corresponding author name: * Vahid Ahmadi. Tel.: ; fax: address: vahid.ahmadi2012@yahoo.com The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. Open access under CC BY-NC-ND license. Selection and peer-review under responsibility of Prof. Dr. Huseyin Uzunboylu & Dr. Mukaddes Demirok, Near East University, Cyprus doi: /j.sbspro

2 Vahid Ahmadi et al. / Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 84 ( 2013 ) The relationships between moral development, attitude and is an important discussion which has not seen so many researches on it. Keljo & Chiristenson (2003) suggested that religiosity and morality are in a symbiosis relationship, and each of them could be revised and mentioned to each other to return from extreme terms. Burris (2002) proposed that religiosity is linked to morality. Per this viewpoint, ethical attitudes and behaviours are due to religion believes. Religiosity put a set of values ( that much of it has been supported by norms) in societies. Sapp & Gladding (1989) also showed that ethical reasoning has negative relationships with internal and external religion. Moreover Duriez and Soenens (2006) suggested that the relationships between religiona symbolic way, second group shows that more moral ability and desire to make a more precise distinction between moral. As mentioned, and while low researches has surveyed the relationships between religiosity and moral development, the present study is going to investigate on the relationships between moral development and religion and religiosity. The hypothesis of the present study is: There is a relationship between moral development and religion and religiosity. Methods Participants Respondents for this study were selected by available sampling method. 169 students (88 male and 81 female) of Shahid Chamran University of Ahwaz in Iran, that respond to our questionnaires. Measures Ma moral development scale: It was developed by Ma in 1989 and had two parts that the first part evaluate altruism and the second part evaluate moral developments. Reliability and internal consistency of second part.64. This measure used a ; translated: Mir Soltani, 2005). In the present study Cronbach's alpha was.68. Religious scale: It is a 20 item questionnaire developed by Allport (1950) that measures both the scale. The Persian form was used. In the present study Cronbach's alpha was.75 Religiosity scale (form A): It was developed by Khodayarifard (2008) to assess religiosity. Form A had 134 item that question 1 to 55 had 1, strongly disagree, to 5, strongly agree scale, question 56 to 134 is on 1 never to 5 always scale, and 9 question assessment religiosity of self and family thoughtfulness, friends and classmates about religiosity. Also it has 3 sub scale: A) cognition and belief (.64), B) tendency and affect (.73), and C) obligation to duties (.68). Results Mean, standard deviation of variables are reported in table 1. A correlation analysis was conducted (Pearson correlations) among all variables included in this study. As shown in Table 2 there are negative significant correlation between morality development with tendency and affect (p=0.05 near to significant, r=-0.15), and obligation to task (p=0.02, r=-0.17). There is no significant correlation between morality development with other subscales of religiosity and religion.

3 676 Vahid Ahmadi et al. / Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 84 ( 2013 ) Table 1.Descriptive statistics of study variables Scale Group M SD tendency and affect Male.. belief Male.. cognition Male.. obligation to task Male.. Total. extrinsic religion Male.. intrinsic religion Male.. Moral development Male.. Moral development tendency and affect Table 2.Correlation coefficients of the variables used in the study belief cognition obligation to task extrinsic religion intrinsic religion r = r = r = r = -0.17* r = 0.05 r = 0.03 * Correlation coefficients significant at the 0.05 level Also, correlation between morality development with religiosity and religion in males and females are reported in table 3. Between female, morality development has significant correlation with obligation to duties(p=0.006, r=- tendency and affect Table 3.Correlation coefficients of the variables used in the study in gender segregation belief cognition obligation to task extrinsic religion intrinsic religion Female r = r = r = r = -0.03* r = 0.17 r = 0.07 Male r = r = r = r = r = r = * Correlation coefficients significant at the 0.01 level Discussion The results of the present study showed that there are negative significant correlation between morality development and tendency, affection, and obligation to duties. So, each person improves in

4 Vahid Ahmadi et al. / Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 84 ( 2013 ) morality developments, tendencies, affect, and obligation to duties will reduce. These results were in the same line as the Kohlberg study (1981) suggested that people shows limited moral developments, since they lost the cognitive capacity for principle reasoning. Also, Siegmund (1979; citation Duriez & Soenens (2006) reported that people improve to the formal stage of Kohlberg, and Deka& Boorta (1988) proposed reduction in principle reasoning that is in stage 5 and 6. This study was not in the same line as some studies like Keljo and Chiristenson (2003) suggested that religiosity and morality are in a symbiosis relationships, and each of them can revision and mention to each other for return back to extreme terms. Whereof Islam is a perfect religion and has guidance to nurture and improvement of morality among people, so whatever a person improves in religiosity he or she should be increased in morality developments but present study does not show this fact. We can attribute it to the morality development scales which we used that is not accordance to Islamic sights. So, it increases among Giligan (1977) mentioned different kinds of onus between male and view. Also Simpson (1974; citation Crain, 2005) said that Kohlberg made a model of stages that basis on western philosophic-rational tradition, then used them without paying attention to differences in morality views of other cultures. So, in present study this scale was criticized on the other site. On the other hand; some items of morality development scales ask about burglary and this kind of actions are forbidden in Islam, so people refused them, therefore they reduce in morality development stages. It means that by increasing religiosity people more limited themselves in the standards reduce and they use more flexibilities in encounter to situations. So, reducing in morality development by increasing religiosity, is natural. Of course, It happens because of wrong perceptions about religiosity. Since, in public, religiosity has become limited to some kinds of inflexible tents or rules, but the facts different. It means that, religion has flexibility in special situations, so religiosity does not limit inflexible frames. In the present study, we perceive that a morality development scale which is pursuant to Islamic rules, is necessary to assess the mortality among Muslims. Also, making a religiosity scale which assess religion in the general without focusing on a special religion necessity. Acknowledgements I would like to acknowledge and extend my heartfelt gratitude to University of Shahid Chamran for hosting this research. References Burris, C. T. (2002). Morality play or playing morality? Intrinsic and socially desirable responding. Journal of Self and Identity, 1, Deka, N., & Broota, K. D. (1988). Relation between level of religiosity and principled moral judgment among four communities in India. Journal of Personality and Clinical Studies, 4, Duriez, B., & Soenens, B. (2006). Religiosity, moral attitudes and moral competence: A critical investigation of the religiosity morality relation. International Journal of Behavioural Development, 30(1), Harward Educational Review, 47, Jan Bozorgi, M. (2007). Religion and mental health. Study in Medicine, 31(4), (printed Persian). John, H. (2010). Religion and Morality. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.substantive revision Fri Oct 1. Keljo, K., & Chiriste Journal of Moral Education, 32(4), Crain, W. C. (2005). Theories of development: Concepts and application. Published by Pearson College Div. Khodayareefard, M. (2008). Research report preparation and standardization of the attitude scale for university students. Published by University of Tehran, Iran. Kohlberg, L. (1981). Essays on moral development, vol.1: The philosophy of moral development. Moral stages and the idea of justice. San Francisco: Harper & Row (pp ). Zentrum 1 Bildungsforschung. Mimeo: University of Konstanz. Ma, H. K. (1989). Moral and moral judgment in adolescents in Hong Kong, Mainland China and England. Journal of Cross Cultural Psychology, 20,

5 678 Vahid Ahmadi et al. / Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 84 ( 2013 ) Ma, H. K. (1989). Moral and moral judgment in adolescents in Hong Kong, Mainland China and England. Translated by MirSoltani, M(1383). Tabriz University of Iran. Nikoee, M., & Seif, S. (2006). Relationship between religiosity and marriage satisfaction. News and researches in counseling, 4(13), (printed Persian). Sapp, G. L., & Gladding, S. T. (1989). Correlates of, religiosity and moral judgment. Counselling and Values, 33,