The aspects of functioning that most obviously involved social cognition
(perspective taking and moral reasoning) increased with age. Specifically,
perspective taking increased from adolescence into the 20s.
Moreover, we found a linear increase in overall (composite) prosocial
moral reasoning and Level 4 (self-reflective, empathic) reasoning, as well
as a decline in rudimentary needs-oriented moral reasoning from adolescence
into early adulthood. The pattern of results for prosocial moral reasoning
is somewhat consistent with that for perspective taking, which is
believed to foster higher level moral reasoning (Colby & Kohlberg, 1987;
Eisenberg, 1986). Indeed, it is possible that changes in perspective-taking
abilities contribute to changes in prosocial moral reasoning; higher level
moral reasoning is viewed as based on social perspective-taking skills
(Colby et al., 1983). Moreover, Eisenberg et al. (2001) found that the measure
of perspective taking used in this study was linked to moral reasoning
and helping (the latter through sympathy) in early adolescence. However,
our analyses demonstrated that the index of perspective taking in this
study did not account to a substantial degree for the changes in overall
prosocial moral reasoning or in Level 2 (needs-oriented) or 4 (self-reflective,
empathic) reasoning. Unfortunately, we did not have a measure of
perspective taking that tapped sophisticated sociocognitive skills (rather
than the propensity to take another’s perspective), so we could not determine
whether change in the ability (rather than tendency) to perspective
taking could account for the age-related changes in prosocial moral
reasoning that were found.