I will address moral development in context, and religious and spiritual growth with respect to acting in situations. One phenomenon concerns the “unhappy moralist effect.” Persons that have to decide between being moral or successful, feel unhappy if they choose morality as a steering power. Consider a negotiation in which instead of slightly cheating and thereby receiving more money, someone chooses to be moral, feels bad afterwards, and thinks he/she doesn’t have enough self-efficacy to manage life. Another effect, from comparing three generations (grand-parents, parents and grand-children), is that the grand-children’s responsibility for moral and religious virtues is mostly either value-lower or higher than the other two generations. The statement “I do not like to share with others” on a Lickert four-point-scale was weighted higher by grand-children. In contrast, children value virtue justice lower than other generations. Additionally, all three generations weight the spiritual behavior as very important, whereas grandparents show a higher estimation towards religious judgment and religious belief. Strong moral or social norms that protect children and adolescents (like not taking drugs) are mostly rated very high. Finally, studies on the correlation between moral mistakes/moral transgressions and religious mistakes or religious judgment indicate that intervention programs show a conceptual change with respect to exclusion, xenophobia and rightwing orientation. One unexpected result is that students who are insecure with their attitude towards strangers and immigrants grow toward more integrative behavior. But students who are right-wing at the beginning are even more right-wing oriented after the intervention. They use or misuse the argumentation of integrative tendencies for their own counter-arguments. How can we scientifically, strategically and diagnostically deal with this phenomenon? Finally, I will show the necessity to combine vertical stage-oriented growth with horizontal change. Intervention studies are only successful in this combination with respect to moral and religious/spiritual learning.

I will address moral development in context, and religious and spiritual growth with respect to acting in situations. One phenomenon concerns the “unhappy moralist effect.” Persons that have to decide between being moral or successful, feel unhappy if they choose morality as a steering power. Consider a negotiation in which instead of slightly cheating and thereby receiving more money, someone chooses to be moral, feels bad afterwards, and thinks he/she doesn’t have enough self-efficacy to manage life. Another effect, from comparing three generations (grand-parents, parents and grand-children), is that the grand-children’s responsibility for moral and religious virtues is mostly either value-lower or higher than the other two generations. The statement “I do not like to share with others” on a Lickert four-point-scale was weighted higher by grand-children. In contrast, children value virtue justice lower than other generations. Additionally, all three generations weight the spiritual behavior as very important, whereas grandparents show a higher estimation towards religious judgment and religious belief. Strong moral or social norms that protect children and adolescents (like not taking drugs) are mostly rated very high. Finally, studies on the correlation between moral mistakes/moral transgressions and religious mistakes or religious judgment indicate that intervention programs show a conceptual change with respect to exclusion, xenophobia and rightwing orientation. One unexpected result is that students who are insecure with their attitude towards strangers and immigrants grow toward more integrative behavior. But students who are right-wing at the beginning are even more right-wing oriented after the intervention. They use or misuse the argumentation of integrative tendencies for their own counter-arguments. How can we scientifically, strategically and diagnostically deal with this phenomenon? Finally, I will show the necessity to combine vertical stage-oriented growth with horizontal change. Intervention studies are only successful in this combination with respect to moral and religious/spiritual learning.

I will address moral development in context, and religious and spiritual growth with respect to acting in situations. One phenomenon concerns the “unhappy moralist effect.” Persons that have to decide between being moral or successful, feel unhappy if they choose morality as a steering power. Consider a negotiation in which instead of slightly cheating and thereby receiving more money, someone chooses to be moral, feels bad afterwards, and thinks he/she doesn’t have enough self-efficacy to manage life. Another effect, from comparing three generations (grand-parents, parents and grand-children), is that the grand-children’s responsibility for moral and religious virtues is mostly either value-lower or higher than the other two generations. The statement “I do not like to share with others” on a Lickert four-point-scale was weighted higher by grand-children. In contrast, children value virtue justice lower than other generations. Additionally, all three generations weight the spiritual behavior as very important, whereas grandparents show a higher estimation towards religious judgment and religious belief. Strong moral or social norms that protect children and adolescents (like not taking drugs) are mostly rated very high. Finally, studies on the correlation between moral mistakes/moral transgressions and religious mistakes or religious judgment indicate that intervention programs show a conceptual change with respect to exclusion, xenophobia and rightwing orientation. One unexpected result is that students who are insecure with their attitude towards strangers and immigrants grow toward more integrative behavior. But students who are right-wing at the beginning are even more right-wing oriented after the intervention. They use or misuse the argumentation of integrative tendencies for their own counter-arguments. How can we scientifically, strategically and diagnostically deal with this phenomenon? Finally, I will show the necessity to combine vertical stage-oriented growth with horizontal change. Intervention studies are only successful in this combination with respect to moral and religious/spiritual learning.

I will address moral development in context, and religious and spiritual growth with respect to acting in situations. One phenomenon concerns the “unhappy moralist effect.” Persons that have to decide between being moral or successful, feel unhappy if they choose morality as a steering power. Consider a negotiation in which instead of slightly cheating and thereby receiving more money, someone chooses to be moral, feels bad afterwards, and thinks he/she doesn’t have enough self-efficacy to manage life. Another effect, from comparing three generations (grand-parents, parents and grand-children), is that the grand-children’s responsibility for moral and religious virtues is mostly either value-lower or higher than the other two generations. The statement “I do not like to share with others” on a Lickert four-point-scale was weighted higher by grand-children. In contrast, children value virtue justice lower than other generations. Additionally, all three generations weight the spiritual behavior as very important, whereas grandparents show a higher estimation towards religious judgment and religious belief. Strong moral or social norms that protect children and adolescents (like not taking drugs) are mostly rated very high. Finally, studies on the correlation between moral mistakes/moral transgressions and religious mistakes or religious judgment indicate that intervention programs show a conceptual change with respect to exclusion, xenophobia and rightwing orientation. One unexpected result is that students who are insecure with their attitude towards strangers and immigrants grow toward more integrative behavior. But students who are right-wing at the beginning are even more right-wing oriented after the intervention. They use or misuse the argumentation of integrative tendencies for their own counter-arguments. How can we scientifically, strategically and diagnostically deal with this phenomenon? Finally, I will show the necessity to combine vertical stage-oriented growth with horizontal change. Intervention studies are only successful in this combination with respect to moral and religious/spiritual learning.