This study aimed to analyze the conceptions of Korean college students of transgressions in a series of multifaced events and to examine the aspects of change in conceptualization through two years' college experience. The study was based on the domain-distinction model of moral development which distinguishes moral events into moral, social-conventional, and personal domains. This study assumed that the conceptions would reflect the moral thought and differences in conceptions its conflict. The conceptions were analyzed by subjects' criterion judgments and their justifications.
This study was consisted of two sub-studies done in 1989 and 1991. The subjects of the 1st year study were 416 college students and 100 professors selected from 9 universities in four major cities (Seoul, Taegu, Kwangjoo, and Pusan). The subjects of the longitudinal analysis of the 2nd year study were, 90 college students who could be followed up in the same universities after two years. The task used in this study was 9 vignettes describing the events that can be usually occurred in collelge campus.
The following conclusions were obtained through the results and discussions of this study.
First., the conceptions of college students and professors of transgressions of multifaceted events reveal a strong declination towards moralizing.
Second, differences in the conceptions of transgressions between college students and professors exist, which are more salient in those of moral and social-conventional transgressions than in personal ones. The difference is resulted from significantly higher moralizing tendency of professors than that of students.
Third, college experience contributes to the change of conceptions of students. The increase of permissibility and the shift from moral judgment and justifications to social-conventional ones are the two most salient patterns of change thorugh the two years' experience of college life.