Rozwój motywacji moralnej dzieci niewidomych w wieku szkolnym

Abstrakt

In the study on the development of moral consciousness of children attention was focused among other problems on the reasons justifying the rightness of morally good activities. During interviews made with 103 blind children and 97 nonblind children, the two groups being representative of three levels of age: from 8 to 9 years of age, 12—13 years of age and 15—10 years of age, the author tried to find out the way in which children independently verbalize the reasons accounting for the necessity of good behaviour, and which motives of moral improvement the children prefer in the situation of the hypothetical choice.

The results obtained pointed out that independently of the relatively constant motive-and-aim-value hierarchy being under formation along with the development of the child concrete circumstances of a given situation strongly condition the preferred kind of motivation. Indeed, the blind expressed as a motive of morally good behaviour the principle of reciprocity, utilitarian attitude directed towards avoidance of punishment and reception of award and egotistic attitude aiming at satisfaction of the need of respect which increases along with the development of the child as well as the need of good opinion, acceptance and affiliation on the side of the environment more often than the non-blind. Thus, with the blind children there dominates an external attitude stronger than with the non-blind. The external attitude can be explained as valuation of activities as desirable through the prism of their own objectives and needs as well as subjection of emotional reactions and activities to the behaviour of people in their environment. Conditions of the development and education of blind children, i.e. living conditions in the boarding house, as well as the inability to see itself hinder the process of creating an apparatus of inward self-observation and readiness to pro-social activities with blind children.

The paper includes some hypotheses of the interpretation of the differences found out during the study, One, for example, points out to the deprivation of psychophysical needs, blindocentrism, the feeling of separateness and difference from the non-blind, the feeling of uncommitted suffering, low self-assessment and the feeling of smaller value, inadequate attitude of parents and disadvantageous elements of living in the boarding house.

It turned out that morality for a blind man has a functional character. Morally good activity can have a compensatory role, or a role of a mediator in the process of satisfying the needs and in the process of realizing the basic aims. It can also be introduced to act in the process of restoring the feeling of one’s own value, social utility and acceptance by the environment. Thus, in the process of education of blind children one should motivate them to concentrate on reaching their goals and competence in the moral field which as well as the intellectual sphere is accessible for the blind on an equal level with the children who can see.