Level of moral reasoning and ego development as factors in predicted vocational success with the mentally retarded

Research in the area of vocational preparation and placement of the mentally retarded emphasizes certain social and emotional characteristics as being of utmost importance in job success. Lawrence Kohlberg's theory of moral reasoning and Jane Loevinger's theory of ego development identify stages of development in which individuals regard as important those same social and emotional characteristics necessary for successful employment of the mentally retarded. The purpose of this study was to compare the stages of moral reasoning and ego development of a group of mentally retarded individuals predicted likely to succeed in employment with a group of mentally retarded individuals predicted unlikely to succeed in employment. Eight Vocational Adjustment Coordinators from four Houston area school districts identified the 25% of their educable mentally retarded clients they predicted to be the most likely to succeed in employment and the 25% of their educable mentally retarded clients they predicted to be the least likely to succeed in employment. Kohlberg's Test of Moral Reasoning and Loevinger's Washington University Sentence Completion Test of Ego Development were individually administered to twenty-five mentally retarded individuals predicted likely to succeed in employment and twenty-five mentally retarded individuals predicted unlikely to be successful in employment. The Chi square Test for Two Independent Samples was used to test the differences in moral reasoning scores between the two groups. The difference was significant at the .01 level of confidence. The Chi square Test for Two Independent Samples was also used to test the difference in ego development scores between the two groups. The difference was significant at the .01 level of confidence. The group predicted likely to succeed in employment scored higher on the moral reasoning and ego development measures than the group predicted unlikely to succeed in employment. In analyzing the correlation of scores on the moral reasoning measure and the ego development measure, the phi coefficient was computed to be .67, significant at the .01 level of confidence. The groups did not show significant differences in other variables such as age, ethnic group, measured I.Q or sex.