The Measure of Moral Orientation (MMO) is one of the few quantitative measures designed to assess how a college student frames his/her conception of morality. This is the first instrument to combine the often opposing theories of Lawrence Kohlberg (decision-making through logic and justice) and Carol Gilligan (decision-making through feelings and care) (6) into one quantitative instrument. Normally, an attempt to tap into the thoughts on a subject as abstract as morality requires personal interviews and extensive time spent with participants (which is an example of qualitative research). While there is no replacement for the rich data one can gain from such an interaction, this instrument provides a valid and reliable quantitative option which could save time and money. In this review I will discuss the Measure of Moral Orientation in relation to the liberal arts educational experience. I will describe the development and structure of the instrument and will suggest situations for its appropriate use.
The instrument is divided into two portions. The first section measures the respondent’s voice, in terms of "care" or "justice"; this analyzes how the respondent reacts to dilemmas involving others. Nine of these dilemmas are presented. These scenarios were developed by focus groups of college students who discussed their experiences in residence halls, classrooms, or other personal situations in which college students often find themselves. Several multiple-choice questions are placed after each dilemma, and respondents are asked if they agree or disagree with each on a four-point scale: "strongly agree," "agree," "disagree," and "strongly disagree" (known as a Likert scale). For example, one dilemma describes a situation where a student accidentally discovers his roommate has AIDS. The final sentence of the dilemma is: "I know that I am not at risk of contracting this disease by casual contact" (6 p. 327). Two questions asked are: "This is a terrible disease: my roommate needs me and I will be there" (p. 327) and, "I think I have a right to know about my roommate’s condition, although my roommate does have a right to privacy" (p. 327).
The second portion of the instrument measures the respondent’s self-perception in terms of "self-care" or "self-justice." It looks at how the respondent sees him/herself when dealing with moral issues. To measure these concepts, students respond to a 14-item questionnaire that probes the self-perception of their moral view, again using the same four-point agree/disagree scale. Since the responses are scaled, and not dichotomous, students can score ‘high’ or ‘low’ in four areas of measurement: justice or care--which are measures of a student’s voice, and self-justice and self-care--which measures a student’s perception of self (4,5).
Who Should Use This? How could it be used?
This instrument would serve as an excellent base for individuals or small groups to learn about aspects of how they prefer to make decisions. For small groups, one could begin an educational program related to ethical and moral development. For example, student affairs professionals may find this useful in starting a conversation about moral orientation with undergraduates training to become paraprofessional staff like resident advisors. RAs or student-run judicial boards are often presented with moral dilemmas. This instrument would help them a) learn their own moral ‘voice’ (either care or justice) and b) understand their self-perception (either connected or separate) when making decisions (4). The students learn not only about their own moral personality, but they also learn that of their peers. Understanding self and others in a student work setting is essential to the development of solid group dynamics, as these students can then see where their own points of view fit into that of the larger group.
When administered in a one-on-one counseling situation, for example with a career counselor, students gain a deeper understanding of where they fit into society. In both the individual and small-group settings, the students develop a deeper sense of self-awareness which, if cultivated, can help them grow through the "normal" student development processes (2).
Morality as an Outcome of the Liberal Arts Experience
Outcomes of the liberal arts educational experience tend to foster higher-order thinking and reasoning structures like critical thinking, reflection, citizenship, and moral development. The Measure of Moral Orientation promotes these outcomes by helping students become more self-aware of their decision-making preferences regarding social issues, the behavior of self and others, and their view of larger societal concerns. College students tend to develop their sense of identity and relationship with the outside world while in college. In a liberal-arts college setting, many students have moved away from their childhood environments for the first time, and they analyze their own world view and compare it to that of others they meet and interact with in the college setting. Through these experiences, they develop their own preferences on decision-making and their view of society (2). The liberal arts college experience involves a crucial time of growth and development for college students. Many college mission statements emphasize these concepts, and the MMO is one way to gauge a student’s view of these higher-order issues.
Administrative Issues: Costs, Data Collection, Scoring, Distribution,
Contact Dr. Debora Liddell at the University of Iowa to discuss the use of the instrument at (319) 335-5188 or via email at debora-liddell@uiowa.edu. She asks anyone interested in using it to submit a brief proposal, research questions, and information about the sample. In return she asks for a summary of the results. For non-students, the cost of the instrument depends on the sample size: $75 for up to 250 participants, $100 for up to 500 participants, and $150 for up to 1000 participants. Liddell sends a packet of information including the instrument itself and a scoring manual. The researcher may score the instruments him/herself. It takes respondents about 25 minutes to complete this paper-and-pencil instrument.
While the instrument is not marketed widely at the national level, it does appear to be used in a variety of settings, the most extensive of which was at James Madison University for their first-year student assessment several years ago.
What is the background of this instrument?
This instrument is based primarily on the theories of two prominent researchers: Lawrence Kohlberg and Carol Gilligan. Kohlberg’s work discusses morality in the framework of social justice and equality (6). Gilligan’s is a reaction to this, purporting that morality can, in addition to the logical social justice side, be based in an ethic of ‘care,’ where relationships with others matter as much as logic (6). Care and justice are the constructs that define the concept of a student’s moral "voice," or the manner in which he or she makes moral and ethical decisions involving others. In addition, the work of Belenky et al. (1) is cited as defining the self-description elements of ‘separate’ knowing (the more logical and detached) and ‘connected’ knowing (the more feeling and personable) (1). These constructs form the concept of a student’s moral "self-perception," which provides the student with a sense of identity of his or her own moral position.
Development of the Instrument
Liddell et al. (6) initially developed 11 moral dilemmas that represent a sample of a college student’s experiences, touching on situations in the residence halls, dealing with changing family situations as children grow older, and other issues that young adults encounter. A group of 28 undergraduate students discussed ways in which these dilemmas could be resolved. Through data collected around their conversations, the researchers developed several questions for each dilemma that measure justice and care orientations. These data also led to the development of the 12-item self-description questionnaire. The four scales: justice, care (voice), self-justice, and self-care (self-assessment) were all tested for reliability and validity using a variety of statistical tests typically used for assessment of psychological instruments. More information on the validity and reliability of the instrument will be presented later in this review.
How or Why Should Institutions Use This Instrument?
The MMO may not be useful at the institutional level. It is ideal for use with small groups or individuals, particularly in situations where participants are interested in furthering their knowledge of self and others around them. It could be difficult to use at a large-scale level or in other situations where there is little time or personnel to help the participants process the meanings of the results and the theories behind the constructs. Complex theories like those that deal with personality preferences require an educational program prior to the instrument’s administration, ample time for the administration of the survey itself, ample time to score the survey, and then, most important, time to process the survey’s results with the participants. Failure to process the information could undermine the importance of such research. One of the more important components of the after-test process is to educate participants on the fact that all persons operate with a blend of "care" voice and "justice" voice. This mix is situational and dependent on age and experience (7). College students could benefit from learning about these differences, but they must be taught in an intentional, thoughtful manner so as to not set different groups against each other. Again, the emphasis must be on how all people use a blend of these different voices, therefore one is not ‘better’ or more effective than the other. Rather, this is a measure of one’s innate personality traits and therefore is not to be judged. Analysis of one’s personality type, however, is a very powerful tool for helping college students grow.
Psychometrics: Does it really Measure what it Purports to Measure?
The 1992 Liddell et al. article reviews the basic psychometrics of the instrument, as well as the initial reason for the instrument’s creation. The authors describe the theories behind the construction of the instrument (Kohlberg and Gilligan) and the ‘hole’ left in the literature: there was no single instrument designed to measure both the judgment and the care orientations. "Without access to an instrument that incorporates both widely recognized constructs, an understanding of the moral development of both men and women at the college level is less than complete" (p. 326). The MMO thus combines these two important theories.
A pilot test was administered to 64 undergraduates of an educational psychology class; low Pearson product-moment correlations between similar variables (i.e. care and self-care) were low enough that the authors revised the initial instrument. A field test was later administered, and measures of internal consistency between same variables (Cronbach’s alpha), measures of convergent validity between similar variables (Pearson product-moment correlations) and measures of discriminant validity between dissimilar variables (Pearson correlations) all either met or exceeded normal ranges for acceptability when compared to other instruments that assess moral development.
It may be of interest to note that the test for internal consistency compared the care and justice data to the feeling (F) and thinking (T) data of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), another personality assessment with proven validity and reliability on these similar scales. Positive correlations with the MBTI variables indicated both a relationship with and reliable statistics for the MMO.
In 1996, Dr. Liddell and a colleague further demonstrated the instrument’s validity and reliability by comparing participants’ responses on the MMO to their responses on the World View Questionnaire (WVQ) and the Defining Issues Test (DIT). The authors used statistical tests to compare the three surveys: if the MMO appeared to be similar to the other two, then it would be accepted that the MMO measures what it purports to measure. Indeed, the results from this analysis were favorable; the MMO’s structure held up to the tests very well. One important issue to consider is that the MMO does not chart one’s moral growth, so it will not indicate if a student’s morality is "low" or "high." Instead, students score "low" or "high" on scales of "care" and "justice." No value judgment is placed on these, as they are measures of one’s personality.
Many believe it is difficult to measure an abstract concept like morality by way of a quantitative instrument (meaning it relates the students’ responses to numbers instead of ideas or concepts). An in-person interview is often considered to be a better manner in which to measure the degree to which one believes in an idea. Liddell’s 1998 article compares the MMO instrument to the use of semi-structured interviews. Two samples of students took the instrument, and portions of each sample in turn participated in personal interviews related to issues of moral orientation. Liddell tape-recorded these interviews, typed them out word for word, and identified responses as relating either to "care" or to "justice" (this process is called data-coding in qualitative research terminology). The results were then compared to responses on the MMO instrument, and the data were analyzed with statistical procedures. The results found that the MMO is indeed a stable instrument measuring what it purports to measure. In addition, Liddell commented on the richness of detail in responses that are unable to be retrieved from a quantitative survey. "[The MMO] provides a valid and reliable snapshot of one’s preferences, but a snapshot is not a portrait, and a score on a standardized instrument provides only part of what educators should know about students" (p. 176). Liddell acknowledges that the MMO is a sound method in which to measure a person’s orientation, but she also understands the importance of taking the time to meet in person with students and discuss these aspects of their personality. Many personal qualities are impossible to measure through a numbers-based instrument.
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