Early adolescence and prosocial moral behavior II: The role of social and contextual influences

This is the second installment of the special issue an prosocial and moral development in early adolescence. This issue focuses on social and contextu al processes in young adolescents' prosocial and moral behaviors. In this i ntroductory article, a brief review of the research on parents or family, p eers, school environment, culture, and nationality as correlates of prosoci al and moral development was presented The research indicates that the soci al context plays an important role in prosocial and moral development. Howe ver research on the social and contextual correlates of prosocial and moral development in early adolescence is at an embryonic stage. Research is nee ded that integrates analyses of individual and social contextual processes to fully understand prosocial and moral development. Moreover, more sophist icated design and assessment procedures and research with racially or ethni cally diverse samples are needed. It is hoped that researchers focus more a ttention on the positive processes and behaviors associated with the variou s social contextual transitions in early adolescence.