New Developments in Understanding Morality: Between Evolutionary Psychology, Developmental Psychology, and Control-Mastery Theory

The aim of this article is to present an overview of several recently proposed hypotheses about the development of morality and guilt during the evolution of our species and the individual psychic development. The article will show how group selection seems to have favored the development of prosocial motivations, emotions, and skills, which are the basis of “moral” judgments and behaviors, and how the specific experiences of each individual and her/his belonging to a specific culture shape this first moral innate “draft.” We will then review relevant empirical data about the development of guilt in infancy and early childhood from empathic concern and the tendency to feel responsible for other people’s wellbeing, and the temperamental and environmental factors at the basis of adaptive and maladaptive guilt. Finally, we will show the substantial compatibility between these recently developed hypotheses and data and the hypotheses developed by the Control-Mastery theory starting from clinical observation and from the ideas of several psychoanalytic authors.