Relations of Peer Acceptance, Friendship Adjustment, and Social Behavior to Moral Reasoning During Early Adolescence

The relations between moral reasoning and six dimensions of peer relationships were examined. Participants were 108 adolescents, age 10 through 13 years, who completed sociometric measures of acceptance, peer behavioral assessment items, a measure to assess the number of their close friendships, a questionnaire on the features of their very best friendship, a measure to assess the frequency of their participation in socializing and agentic activities with close friends, and the Kohlberg moral judgment interview. Results indicated that moral reasoning was related significantly and positively to leadership status, prosocial behaviors (for girls), antisocial behaviors (for boys), number of close friendships, and socializing and agentic activities (for girls). Results also revealed that social behaviors mediate the link between early adolescents’moral reasoning and their peer acceptance as operationalized in terms of leadership status. Results are discussed in terms of the significance of peer relationships in the moral reasoning of early adolescents.