Morality in buddhism and psychology: a comparative study of kohlberg’s stages of moral development and the noble eightfold path

Author: 
*Unnati Jain

When employed in a descriptive sense, morality possesses a crucial quality that "morality" in a normative meaning lacks: a quality that results from its relational aspect. This characteristic is that believing a particular account of what morality imbibes, in a descriptive manner, that does not bear on how an individual feels or behaves if they are not a part of a relevant group or society. The normative definition of morality is, nevertheless, accepted provided that characterization of moral agents and conditions supported by all moral agents and a code of conduct is accepted even as a moral code. Accepting a normative explanation of morality forces one to view certain behaviours as immoral, possibly even ones that they are tempted to engage in. This paper aims to understand what the term ‘morality’ means, closely examine and study the key differences between the moralist perspectives of Buddhism and psychology in order to further understand their approaches to life, parallelly, Objective : The objective of this paper is to compare and reflect on moralist perspectives of Buddhism and psychology within the given contexts of the title, in order to help understand their approaches to life parallelly. Research Question : How can morality be understood from Buddhist and Psychological perspectives? In what ways do the two approaches differ in shaping our understanding of morality?

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DOI: 
http://dx.doi.org/10.24327/ijcar.2023.2698.1588
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Volume12