Journal of Adolescence 1998, 21, 275–289
Article No. ad980153
Adolescents’ and children’s knowledge about rights: some
evidence for how young people view rights in their own lives
MARTIN D. RUCK, DANIEL P. KEATING, RONA ABRAMOVITCH
AND CHRISTOPHER J. KOEGL
The present study examined the development of knowledge about rights from
childhood to adolescence. One hundred and sixty-nine 8–16-year-olds participated in
individual semi-structured interviews assessing knowledge and importance of rights
both generally and in children’s and adolescents’ lives. Detailed content analyses
indicated that a global stage account may not capture key features of the development
of young people’s knowledge about rights. Even the oldest adolescents consistently
“defined” rights in concrete rather than abstract terms. In contrast, by 10 years of age
the majority of subjects were aware of the universal nature of rights. These results
suggest that what adolescents and children think about rights appears to be influenced
by how they view rights in their own lives. The findings are discussed in terms of
developmental theory and in relation to practical implications for children’s rights.
© 1998 The Association for Professionals in Services for Adolescents
Introduction
The notion of young people possessing specific rights is considered to be of relatively
recent origin (for complete historical reviews see Takanishi, 1978; Hart and Pavolic,
1991; Hawes, 1991). The children’s rights1 movement, formed during the 19th century,
initially focused on providing children with rights of protection and welfare—in other
words nurturance rights. As issues relating to children became the focal point of social
reform, society was required to more clearly spell out its obligations to children (Takanishi, 1978). For example, the Geneva Declaration of the Rights of the Child, endorsed by
the League of Nations in 1924, and the Declaration of the Rights of the Child adopted
by the United Nations in 1959, both served to proclaim children’s protection rights.
More recently, however, there has been a growing concern about children’s rights to
self-determination (Takanishi, 1978; Hart and Pavlovic, 1991) and, concomitant with
that concern, a desire to grant children some of the rights traditionally accorded only to
adults.
Increased recognition of adolescents and children as individuals having rights is evident in the medical and mental health professions, social services and educational
systems. Internationally, the emphasis on children’s rights is evident in the recently ratified U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child (United Nations General Assembly,
Reprint requests and correspondence should be addressed to M. D. Ruck, Department of Psychology,
University of Toronto at Mississauga, Mississauga, Ontario L5L 1C6, Canada.
1
As described in our previous work (see Ruck et al ., 1998) “children’s rights” is a generic term including
both children and adolescents who have not yet reached the age of maturity as determined either by state, provincial or federal legislation. Unless otherwise stated, the phrase children’s rights retains this meaning in the
present study.
0140-1971/98/030275+15/$30·00/0
©1998 The Association for Professionals in Services for Adolescents
275
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M. D. Ruck et al.
1989), where children’s political, educational, social, civic and cultural rights are
defined. At the time of writing this paper 167 countries had ratified the Convention
(Murphy-Berman and Weiss, 1996), which serves to increase the commitment of nations
worldwide to children’s nurturance and self-determination rights.
Efforts to increase children’s nurturance rights are largely made to ensure that children are safe, well cared for and legally protected. Attempts to increase children’s
self-determination rights, on the other hand, are made on the assumption that young
people have the right to take an active part in many of the decisions regarding their own
lives. Unfortunately, there is relatively little empirical work dealing with young people’s
understanding and knowledge about either type of right. The research available has primarily been concerned with adolescents’ and children’s understanding about rights
(including human and domestic) and rights-related issues and has placed much less
importance on the development of their general knowledge about rights.
With respect to what young people know about human rights, Torney and Brice
(1979, cited in Torney-Purta, 1982) found that 9- to 13-year-olds possessed a basic
understanding of the universality of human rights. However, these same children were
unable to provide a definition of human rights. More recently, Wade (1994) noted that
with regard to human rights elementary school children reported that children should
have the freedom to do what they want.
Melton (1980, 1983) has provided the best known account of the development of
children’s reasoning about rights in hypothetical situations as well as general knowledge
of rights. He reported a developmental progression from an egocentric stage, based on
perceiving rights in terms of what one can have or do, characteristic of young children,
to an abstract stage of thinking about rights based on moral considerations, not typically
seen before early adolescence. More recently, however, Melton and Limber (1992)
examined cross-cultural differences (between American and Norwegian samples) in what
children know about rights. They found that a similar stage-like progression in thinking
and knowledge about rights was also evident in Norwegian children. A major difference,
however, between the two groups focused on self-determination vs . nurturance rights.
With regard to the former, American children viewed self-determination rights as more
salient than Norwegian children, whereas Norwegian children placed greater emphasis
on special entitlements and protection for children than their American counterparts.
Studies have also examined young people’s reasoning with regard to civil liberties
such as freedom of religion and expression (Helwig, 1995) and nurturance and self-determination rights in contexts such as home and school (Ruck et al., 1998). For example,
Helwig (1995) found that by early adolescence children held sophisticated (abstract)
conceptions of freedom of speech and religion, which suggest that a hard stage account
does not fully account for the reasoning of young adolescents with regard to judgments of
certain civil liberties. More recently, Ruck et al . (1998) reported that a global stage
framework does not characterize adolescents’ and children’s ability to reason about nurturance and self-determination rights; rather, young people’s thinking about rights
appears to be highly influenced both by the societal or social context (e.g. at home or in
school) in which the right is embedded, and type of right (e.g. nurturance or self-determination) they are asked to judge. In addition, and of significance with regard to the
present study, how children and adolescents think about rights also appears to reflect
their understanding of rights in their own lives (Helwig, 1997; Ruck et al., 1998). This
Adolescents’ and children’s knowledge
277
finding of important contextual effects is in accord with evidence on adolescent thinking
in other domains (Keating, 1990).
Other research has addressed young people’s reasoning about the rights they have in a
variety of other contexts such as medical (Lewis et al., 1978; Weithorn and Campbell,
1982; Belter and Grisso, 1984), legal (Ferguson and Douglas, 1970; Grisso, 1981; Abramovitch et al ., 1993, 1995 a ; Peterson-Badali and Abramovitch, 1993) and research
settings (Abramovitch et al., 1991, 1995b). These studies have found that young children
have very little understanding of the function of their rights in these contexts, and even
adolescents are not fully cognizant of some important aspects of the rights they have in
legal and medical situations.
The purpose of the research reported here, primarily descriptive in nature, was to
examine adolescents’ and children’s general notions about what it means to have rights,
what rights they view as salient in their own lives, and what importance they give to
rights. In general, it was expected that the development of children’s and adolescents’
knowledge about rights would reveal sensitivity to how they view rights in their own
lives, rather than adhering closely to a hard stage progression which may be more evident when presenting abstract dilemmas. In addition, we were also interested in
examining subjects’ views of whether or not they believe their own rights are revocable
and the rationales on which these beliefs are based.
Method
Participants
A total of 169 young people participated in semi-structured individual interviews. The
sample consisted of 31 8-year-olds (mean age 8-4 [years-months], 15 females and 16
males), 34 10-year-olds (mean age 10-4, 18 females and 16 males), 32 12-year-olds
(mean age 12-6), 34 14-year-olds (mean-age 14-7, 16 females and 16 males) and 38
16-year-olds (mean age 16-8, 21 females and 17 males). The sample was predominantly
White (over 80%) and ranged from lower class to upper middle class. All subjects were
selected on the basis of written parental consent and subjects were also required to give
their assent to participate. All participants were recruited from schools in the Metropolitan Toronto area.
Procedure
The semi-structured interview consisted of two parts. In part one of the interview, subjects were presented with a series of standard open-ended rights knowledge questions,
adapted from Melton (1980), designed to assess knowledge and importance of rights in
general contexts and of specific rights belonging to them. The standard interview questions were: What is a right? Who has rights? Do children have rights? What rights do
children have? Why should children have rights? Can anyone take away your rights?
Pilot testing indicated that adolescents always included reference to themselves with
regard to the term “children.” In part two, subjects were presented with a variety of
hypothetical vignettes in which a child protagonist wishes to exercise a right (either nurturance or self-determination) in conflict with the wishes of those in authority. Data
pertaining to children’s reasoning about the vignettes have been described elsewhere
278
M. D. Ruck et al.
(Ruck et al ., 1998). The order of presentation for parts one and two were counterbalanced. Statistical analyses indicated there were no effects of order. Participants were
interviewed in a quiet room or area supplied by each school. The entire interview took
approximately 25 to 35 minutes to complete for each participant.
Coding and intercoder agreement
Employing a detailed content analysis (see Holsti, 1969; Krippendorff, 1991 for a full
description) participant’s responses to interview questions requiring other than a “yes” or
“no” response were categorized according to coding schemes developed post hoc and
based in part on earlier work (Ruck et al., 1998). For some questions responses were classified by assigning them to mutually exclusive categories while for others questions
non-mutually exclusive categories were employed. Intercoder agreement calculated on a
randomly selected 30% of the protocols and expressed as per cent agreement for each
question ranged from 78% (for categories of reasoning for the question, “can any one
take away your rights?”) to 98% (for categories of knowledge for the question, “who has
rights?”) (overall mean=86%). Uncertainties or discrepancies in the codings were
resolved through discussion.
Results
Log-linear analysis was used as the principal method of data analysis to estimate categorical effects. Saturated models using age, sex and type of response were computed for each
question. Significant parameter estimates are presented below; an alpha level of 0·05 was
used as the cutoff for significance. Where any parameter for age was significant,
chi-square tests were used to determine the exact direction of age-related trends in
young people’s knowledge of rights, in a manner analogous to the ANOVA post hoc test. In
some cases, due to the relatively small percentage of subjects mentioning specific themes
or categories, it was necessary to combine age groups in order to obtain higher expected
values for chi-square analyses. An alpha level of 0·01 was used for this portion of the
analyses due to the large number of chi-square tests performed. Where appropriate,
chi-square analyses were corrected for continuity. Only significant effects are reported.
Knowledge and importance of rights
What is a right? Participants’ responses to this question were divided into eight mutually exclusive thematic categories: don’t know, or no response; misconception (e.g. “to
not be wrong”); laws/rules (e.g. “it’s a law you must follow,” “they are like rules”); protection/safety (e.g. “they keep you safe,” “it stops people from abusing you”); to do/want
(e.g. “it’s something you want to do,” “you are allowed to do it”); to have/given (e.g. “it’s
something everyone has,” “people give them to you”); beliefs/principles (e.g. “they are
your beliefs,” “they are principles you follow”); privileges/entitlements (e.g. “they are like
a privilege you are given,” “they are things you are entitled to”). Table 1 presents the
percentage of subjects by age mentioning these specific categories.
Log-linear analysis revealed significant age differences for the following two categories: don’t know; and to do/want (p-values of p<0·001 and p<0·003, respectively). The
results of separate chi-square tests revealed that 8-year-olds were more likely to say they
Adolescents’ and children’s knowledge
279
don’t know than all older children (significant difference between 8-year-olds and 10-,
12-, 14- and 16-year-olds combined, x 2(1)=42·50, p <0·001). In addition, 8-year-olds
were less likely to describe rights in terms of the to do/want category in comparison to
older children (significant difference between 8-year-olds and 10-, 12-, 14- and
16-year-olds combined, x2(1)=7·83, p<0·003).
Who has rights? Responses to this question were placed into one or more of the following thematic categories: don’t know; children (e.g. “kids,” “my friends”); unspecified
authority figures (e.g. “grown-ups,” “adults”); specific authority figures (e.g. “my parents,” “teachers”); not everyone (e.g. “only certain people”); everyone (e.g. “all people
have them,” “everybody does”). A small percentage of responses which could not be categorized according to the coding scheme were assigned to category known as “other.”
The percentage of subjects by age group mentioning specific thematic categories for the
question is displayed in Table 2.
Log-linear analysis indicated significant age differences for the following three thematic categories: don’t know; specific authority figures; and everybody (p-values ranging
from p<0·001 to p<0·02). Chi-square tests revealed that older children were less likely
than 8-year-olds to mention the following: don’t know (significant difference between
8-year-olds and 10-, 12-, 14- and 16-year-olds combined, x2(1)=31·16, p<0·001); and
specific authority figures (significant difference between 8-year-olds and 10-, 12-, 14Table 1 Percentage of subjects by age mentioning each thematic category for the question
“What is a right?”
Category
Don’t know
Misconception
Laws/rules
Protection/safety
To do/want
To have given
Beliefs/principles
Privileges/entitlements
8
45
16
7
0
29
0
3
0
10
9
3
15
9
62
3
0
0
Years of age
12
3
7
10
3
63
7
3
3
14
0
0
18
0
65
9
3
15
16
0
0
16
5
48
16
0
18
Table 2 Percentage of subjects by age mentioning each thematic category for the question
“Who has rights?”
Category
Don’t know
Children
Unspecified authority
Specific authority
Not everybody
Everybody
Other
8
29
13
13
39
13
23
10
10
6
9
3
15
3
73
0
Years of age
12
0
7
10
3
0
73
7
14
0
0
0
0
0
97
0
16
0
0
0
0
10
89
0
280
M. D. Ruck et al.
and 16-year-olds combined, x2(1)=27·40, p<0·001) in terms of who has rights. In contrast, older children were more likely in comparison to 8-year-olds to espouse the belief
that everybody has rights (significant difference between 8-year-olds and 10-, 12, 14- and
16-year-olds, x2(1)=50·50, p<0·001).
Do children have rights? For the question “do children have rights?” the majority of
subjects responded in the affirmative with 58% of the 8-year-olds, 91% of the
10-year-olds, 97% of the 12-year-olds and 100% of both the 14- and 16-year-olds claiming that children have rights. Log-linear analysis revealed a significant age difference for
this question (p<0·001). Chi-square tests indicated that 8-year-olds were significantly
less likely to know that children have rights than all older subjects (10-, 12-, 14- and
16-year-olds combined), x2(1)=40·25, p<0·001.
What rights do children have? Responses to this question were placed into one or
more of the following thematic categories: don’t know; misconceptions (e.g. “to be
right,” “not to be wrong”); recreation/play (e.g. “to play after school,” “to have fun”);
education (e.g. “to go to school,” “to get an education”); decision-making (“to make
decisions on my own,” “to do what I want”); care/safety (e.g. “to not be abused,” “to
have food and clothing”); civil liberties (e.g. “freedom of speech,” “freedom of association”); legal rights (e.g. “right to an attorney,” “right to silence”). Table 3 presents the
percentage of subjects by age mentioning specific types of rights in response to the
question.
Log-linear analysis indicated significant age differences for the following categories:
don’t know; misconceptions; recreation/play; education; care/safety; and make decisions
(all p-values ranging from p<0·01 to p<0·001). The results of separate chi-square tests
revealed that older children in comparison to younger children were significantly less
likely to mention the following categories: don’t know (significant difference between
8-year-olds and 10-, 12-, 14- and 16-year-olds combined, x 2 (1)=31·20, p <0·001);
misconceptions (significant difference between 8-year-olds and 10-, 12-, 14- and
16-year-olds combined, x 2(1)=7·12, p <0·001); recreation/play (significant difference
between 8-, 10- and 12-year-olds combined and 14- and 16-year-olds combined,
x 2(1)=16·58, p <0·001). Older children in comparison to younger children were more
Table 3 Percentage of subjects by age mentioning each thematic category for the question
“What rights do children have?”
Category
Don’t know
Misconception
Recreation/play
Education
To make decisions
Care/safety
Civil liberties
Legal rights
Other
8
35
26
19
3
16
6
0
0
13
10
6
15
41
15
47
29
0
0
0
Years of age
12
0
10
37
23
63
27
0
10
10
14
3
6
9
38
53
56
12
15
15
16
3
0
3
53
74
45
21
18
18
Adolescents’ and children’s knowledge
281
likely to mention the following types of rights: education (significant difference between
8- and 10-year-olds combined with 12-, 14- and 16-year-olds combined, x 2(1)=16·41,
p<0·001); care/safety (significant difference between 8-year-olds and 10-, 12-, 14- and
16-year-olds combined, x2(1)=11·09, p<0·001); and make decisions (significant difference between 8-year-olds and 10-, 12-, 14- and 16-year-olds combined, x 2(1)=17·36,
p<0·001). In addition, log-linear analysis indicated a significant age by gender interaction ( p <0·001) for the don’t know category. Eight-year-old females (60%) were
significantly more likely than females of all other ages (0%) to be unable to provide
examples of children’s rights (significant difference between 8-year-old females and 10-,
12-, 14- and 16-year-old females combined, x2(1)=43·01, p<0·001). There was no significant differences between males, with only 12% of 8- and 10-year-olds and 0%, 7%
and 6% of 12-, 14- and 16-year-olds, respectively, responding “don’t know” to the question of what rights do children have.
Why should children have rights? Participant’s responses to this question were
placed in one or more of the following thematic categories: don’t know; universality (e.g.
“everyone should have them,” “kids are people too and should have rights”); teaching
responsibility, values/future use (e.g. “having rights teaches you respect and values,” “if
you have rights you will know how to use them as adults”); protection/safety (e.g. “kids
should have rights in order to keep adults from abusing them,” “so you won’t be
neglected”); self-determination/freedom (e.g. “kids should have rights so they can do
what they want,” “so they can be free”); misconception (e.g. “children need rights so
they won’t be wrong”). A small percentage of responses that did not fit into the coding
scheme were placed in the Other category. The percentage of subjects by age group providing specific rationales for the question is presented in Table 4.
Log-linear analysis indicated significant age differences for the following thematic categories: don’t know; responsibility/values; and self-determination (p-values ranging from
p <0·02 to p <0·001). Chi-square tests indicated that 8-year-olds in comparison to all
older children were more likely to refer to the don’t know category (significant differences between 8-year-olds and 10-, 12-, 14- and 16-year-olds combined, x 2(1)=33·31,
p<0·001). Older children in comparison to younger children were more likely to refer to
responsibility/values (significant difference between 8-, 10- and 12-year-olds combined
Table 4 Percentage of subjects by age mentioning each thematic category for the question
“Why should children have rights?”
Category
Don’t know
Universality
Responsibility/values
Protection/safety
Self-determination
Misconception
Other
8
45
6
3
6
0
19
16
10
12
12
12
26
29
6
8
Years of age
12
7
17
10
10
47
0
10
14
0
15
38
23
38
0
0
16
3
21
39
21
37
0
5
282
M. D. Ruck et al.
and 14- and 16-year-olds combined, x 2 (1)=20·72, p <0·001); and self-determination
(significant difference between 8-year-olds and 10-, 12-, 14- and 16-year-olds combined,
x2(1)=15·01, p<0·001) as reasons why children should have rights.
To summarize briefly, by approximately 10 years of age children have developed an
understanding of rights as something one can do or wants to do. In addition, by 10 years
of age children see self-determination as an important reasoning for having rights and
also develop the awareness of rights as universal, although neither they, nor any of the
other age groups, explicitly identified universality as a fundamental reason why children
should have rights. In terms of the rights children have, the right to recreation and play
was more salient for 10- and 12-year-olds than for older subjects. With regard to reasons
children should have rights, by 10 years of age children view self-determination as an
important consideration, while 14- and 16-year-olds’ responses also begin to mention
instilling responsibility as a reason for children having rights.
Revocability of rights
Can anyone take away your rights? Next, subjects were asked if their rights are
revocable. For the question “can anyone take away your rights,” don’t know responses
account for only 11% of the total responses and were therefore excluded from the analysis. Fifty per cent of 8-year-olds, 43% of 10-year-olds, 24% of 12-year-olds, 82% of
14-year-olds and 78% of 16-year-olds believed that their rights could in fact be taken
away. Log-linear analysis also indicated significant age differences for the question
(p<0·001). Chi-square tests revealed that 8-, 10- and 12-year-olds combined were significantly less likely than 14- and 16-year-olds combined to report that their rights could be
taken away, x2(1)=25·10, p<0·001.
In addition, log-linear analysis revealed a significant age by gender effect (p<0·003).
None of the 8-year-old females (0%) and fewer than half the 10- and 12-year-old females
(40% and 29%, respectively) reported that their rights could be rescinded, while at 14and 16-years of age the clear majority of females subjects (89% and 85%, respectively)
felt that their rights could be taken away (significant difference between 8-, 10- and
12-year-old females combined and 14- and 16-year-old females combined, x2(1)=25·77,
p <0·001). For males a somewhat different pattern of responding emerged. Fewer than
half of 10- and 12-year-old males (46% and 20%, respectively) reported that they could
lose their rights as compared to the majority of 8-, 14- and 16-year-old males (79%, 71%
and 71%, respectively) who believed that their rights could be restricted (significant difference between 10- and 12-year-old males combined and 8-, 14- and 16-year-old males
combined, x2(1)=10·36, p<0·001).
Finally, we were also interested in subjects’ rationales as to whether or not their rights
can be taken away. The analyses excluded subjects answering “don’t know” to the preceding question as a preliminary analyses indicated that the majority of these subjects
(89%) could not provide a rationale to justify their decision.
Subject’s justifications for why their rights could be either revoked or not revoked
were assigned to one or more of the following categories: don’t know; parent’s/grown-ups
(e.g. “parents can take away your rights,” “no one can take away your rights because
grown-ups gave them to you”); government (e.g. “sometimes the government restricts
people’s rights”); police/court (e.g. “if the police arrest you then you have no rights,” “in
Adolescents’ and children’s knowledge
283
some cases the court will take your rights away,” “even the police cannot take away your
rights”); general authority/power (e.g. “if someone is bigger than you they can take away
your rights,” “if they threaten you they can take away your rights,” “even if someone is
bigger than you they can’t take away your rights”); laws/rules (e.g. “if you break the rules
you will lose all your rights,” “the laws says your rights can’t be taken away”);
wrong-doing/punishment (e.g. “if you do something wrong you can forfeit your rights,”
“if you are bad you can lose your rights”); inherent possessions (e.g. “they are your rights
no one can take them away from you,” “rights belong to you”); principles/beliefs (e.g.
“rights are what you believe so they can’t take them away,” “rights are what you think so
they can’t take them from you”). A small percentage of responses which could not be
categorized according to the coding scheme were assigned to the Other category. Table 5
presents the percentage of subjects by age mentioning specific themes or explanations as
to whether or not their rights could be revoked.
Log-linear analysis indicated significant age effects for the following thematic categories: parents/grown-ups; wrong-doing/punishments; inherent possessions; and principles/
beliefs (p-values ranging from p<0·003 to p<0·001). The results of chi-square tests
revealed that younger children in comparison to older children were more likely to mention parents/grown-ups (significant difference between 8- and 10-year-olds combined
and 12-, 14- and 16-year-olds combined, x2(1)=9·95, p<0·002) and inherent possessions
(significant difference between 8-, 10- and 12-year-olds combined and 14- and
16-year-olds combined, x 2 (1)=9·06, p <0·003) when explaining whether their rights
could be taken away. Older children were more likely than younger children to mention
wrong-doing/punishment (significant difference between 8-, 10- and 12-year-olds combined and 14- and 16-year-olds, x2(1)=22·80, p<0·001) when providing an explanation
as to whether their rights could be revoked. Finally, 12-year-olds were more likely than
subjects at all other ages (significant difference between 12-year-olds and 8-, 10-, 14and 16-year-olds combined, x2(1)=24·96, p<0·001) to refer to rights as principles/beliefs
when explaining whether or not their rights could be taken away. In addition, log-linear
Table 5 Percentage of subjects by age mentioning each category of justification for whether
their rights could be revoked
Category
Don’t know
Parents/grown-ups
Government
Police/court
General power
Laws/rules
Wrong-doings/punish
Inherent possessions
Principles/beliefs
Other
8
0
37
0
0
9
9
9
27
0
27
10
4
32
11
7
4
11
11
28
4
14
Years of age
12
0
14
3
7
0
10
3
38
24
13
14
3
15
24
12
3
18
42
9
0
15
16
3
5
8
11
19
16
38
11
0
8
Subjects answering “don’t know” to the question “can anyone take away your rights?” were
excluded.
284
M. D. Ruck et al.
analysis indicated a significant age by gender interaction ( p <0·01) for the parents or
adults theme. For males there was a decrease with age in the percentage of subjects referring to parents or adults from 48% of 8- and 10-year-olds combined to 4% of 12-, 14- and
16-year-olds combined (significant difference between 8- and 10-year-old males combined and 12-, 14- and 16-year-old males combined, x 2 (1)=17·40, p<0·001). For
females, however, there was no significant change with age with only 17% of 8- and
10-year-olds combined and 17% of 12-, 14- and 16-year-olds combined mentioning the
parents or adults category.
To determine the effect of subjects’ “yes” or “no” responses regarding whether their
rights could be revoked, justifications were examined by type of response. For subjects
who believed their rights could be taken away chi-square tests indicated that younger
subjects (8-, 10- and 12-year-olds combined) were significantly more likely than older
subjects (14- and 16-year-olds combined) to mention that parents/adults can take away
their rights, x 2(1)=19·13, p<0·001. When subjects maintained that their rights could
not be revoked, 12-year-olds were more likely than all other subjects (8-, 10-, 14- and
16-year-old combined) to describe their rights as principles/beliefs that could not be
taken away, x2(1)=11·63, p<0·001.
Discussion
The main purpose of this investigation was to examine young people’s general knowledge
of rights. In the present study adolescents’ and children’s knowledge about rights was
examined through the use of open-ended interview questions and a detailed content
analysis. The results of the present study provide an interesting picture of the development of young people’s general knowledge about rights and point towards directions for
future research.
Young people’s responses to the question “what is a right” did not suggest a simple
age-linked progression from an egocentric concept to one based on moral considerations,
evident in the fact that the majority of even the oldest participants in this study
described a right in terms of the concrete limits of “what one can do or wants to do.”
This finding contrasts somewhat with previous research (e.g. Melton, 1980, 1983; Melton and Limber, 1992) reporting that children and adolescents’ knowledge about rights
exhibits an age-related progression from concrete to abstract thinking. In the present
study, when even the oldest participants were asked to define a “right” the responses
seem to be more in line with how subjects of all ages view rights in their own lives rather
than in terms of abstract principles. We suggest that such a conception of rights may represent a more accurate portrayal of young people’s spontaneous knowledge.
The questions pertaining to adolescents’ and children’s views and reasoning as to
whether their rights can be revoked also provides evidence as to how they perceive rights
in their own lives. Recall that even participants from the oldest age group (16-year-olds)
stated that their rights could be taken away, whereas previous research suggests that by
mid-adolescence young people should understand that rights are not revocable by
authority (Melton and Limber, 1992). This contrast may again be attributed to a format
that asks young people’s views about rights in an open-ended format vs. one that asks for
abstract reasoning about hypothetical dilemmas (cf., Helwig, 1995). Young people rou-
Adolescents’ and children’s knowledge
285
tinely see their rights revoked or restricted by those in authority, especially in situations
where exercising their rights would conflict with the wishes of those in authority. One
does not have to be reminded of the many instances where parents revoke a child’s nurturance rights (e.g. “being sent to bed without supper”) or restrict an adolescents’
self-determination rights (e.g. “being grounded”). Therefore, it should come as no surprise that the majority of young people in the present study see their rights as capable of
being revoked.
However, the data also suggest that adolescents and older children (e.g. 10-year-olds)
do possess abstract conceptions regarding specific aspects of their rights knowledge, a
finding also reported by Torney and Brice (1979, cited in Torney-Purta, 1982) who
found that by 9 years of age the majority of children they interviewed were aware that
“human beings have certain rights by virtue of being human” (Torney-Purta, 1982,
p. 36). For example, in the present investigation, by 10 years of age the majority of children spoke of the universal nature of rights when asked who has rights. In addition,
12-year-olds (approximately 32%) in the present study described a right in concrete
terms but held abstract justifications as to why rights cannot be revoked. Taken together
these two findings suggests that by 10 years of age children are able to hold both concrete and at least rudimentary abstract views about various aspects of rights. These
findings also illustrate the difficulty in inferring adolescents’ and children’s knowledge
about rights solely from how they reason about rights.
How might we explain the finding that only 12-year-olds, an age more likely to hold
concrete views about social order than older children (Adelson, 1972), held abstract
rationales regarding the revocability of rights? An explanation that seems plausible is
that this group of 12-year-olds, who we can speculate to be at or entering formal operations, were exhibiting a type of formal operational egocentrism (Inhelder and Piaget,
1958; Piaget, 1970). As such, these children have not yet come to adjust all aspects of
their idealistic thinking about their social world to the actual realities of their dependent
status. However, based on such an explanation we might also expect to find this group of
children defining a “right” in terms of abstract conceptions, yet this was not the case.
Further research is clearly needed to determine the exact nature of the relationship
between adolescents’ and children’s reasoning and knowledge in this domain.
As in investigations of children’s knowledge of human rights (e.g. Wade, 1994),
self-determination rights were extremely salient for participants in the present investigation. For instance, by 10 years of age the subjects we interviewed viewed
self-determination as an important reason for young people to have rights. In contrast,
nurturance rights in the form of protection from harm (care and safety category) and certain entitlements (education category) were less likely to be mentioned by the younger
subjects as rights either belonging or important to children. Perhaps not surprisingly
these findings correspond closely to previous research (Melton, 1980, 1983; Melton and
Limber, 1992) with regard to how American children view both types of rights. One
minor difference should be noted. In the present investigation nurturance rights were
mentioned by approximately 33% of participants compared to being mentioned by less
than 10% of the American children in the Melton and Limber study (1992). In addition,
our own recent work (Ruck et al., 1998) examining children’s reasoning about nurturance and self-determination issues indicates that Canadian children tend to have
extremely positive views towards both types of rights. Further examination of the differ-
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ences in terms of what young people know and how they think about both nurturance
and self-determination rights is needed.
Gender differences have not typically been reported in the majority of studies examining children’s knowledge and reasoning about rights (e.g. Melton, 1980, 1983;
Torney-Purta, 1982; Melton and Limber, 1992; Helwig, 1995; Cherney and Perry, 1996).
Recently, however, gender differences have been found in research examining young
people’s judgments of freedom of speech and religion, with males being less likely than
females to endorse rights and more likely than females to support authority with regard
to freedom of speech (Helwig, 1997). In the present investigation several interesting age
by gender interactions also emerged. There were clear differences in terms of how males
and females responded according to age. Eight-year-old females were less likely than all
other females to know what rights children have. Eight-, 10- and 12-year-old females in
comparison to older females, and 10- and 12-year-old males compared to all other males
were more likely to report that their rights could not be taken away. Finally, 8- and
10-year-old males were more likely than all other males to report that parents or adults
could take away their rights. It is possible that the findings relate to how gender differences in behavior may lead to differences in terms of how boys and girls at this age
experience their social world (Ruble, 1988; Helwig, 1997). For instance, with regard to
the finding that the youngest males were more likely to say that parents or adults can
take away their rights, it may be the case that boys who are more active and also greater
risk-takers than girls (Lewis et al., 1984; Achenbach, 1991) are more likely to engage in
activities that may require some type of parental intervention (e.g. “put that down!,”
“stop doing that!”). Thus for children perceiving rights in terms of what they can do or
want to do boys may be more familiar with parents or adults stopping them from engaging
in many of the activities that could result in potential harm. However, we can offer no
compelling explanations for the other gender differences. Clearly, until future research
determines the exact nature of the gender differences reported in the present study caution is warranted with regard to how one interprets these findings.
In summary, these findings suggest that focusing only on a global trend toward more
abstract representation of rights may obscure important features of young people’s thinking. For example, the degree of abstract representation may vary depending on whether
young people are invited to think about rights in general vs. with regard to their own
lives. This variability is important to understand theoretically, but also has substantial
implications for practice.
The findings of this investigation have a number of important practical implications.
For instance, previous studies have reported that young people often have difficulty in
reasoning about and making use of the rights they have in legal contexts (e.g. right to
silence) which can have a profound impact on their lives. This is hardly surprising given
the current finding that even the majority of adolescents interviewed were not aware
that they possess such important rights. Hence, adolescents’ and children’s inability to
reason adequately about and make effective use of the rights they have in crucial
real-world situations (e.g. legal rights) may stem in part from limitations in terms of what
they know about rights generally. However, this point should not be interpreted as
implying that adolescents’ and children’s lack of knowledge about these types of rights
means they are incapable of reasoning about them (see Helwig, 1995). In addition, the
data also address concerns about extending children’s rights. There has typically been a
Adolescents’ and children’s knowledge
287
great deal of societal trepidation over granting children insights of self-determination
arising from an explicit or implicit belief that somehow young people will misuse or take
advantage of the self-determination rights they are accorded (Ruck, 1994). In the
present study, however, young people were aware that with rights comes a measure of
responsibility. Recall that participants from the two oldest age groups stressed the importance of having rights as a way to teach responsibility. This is a finding that has not been
previously reported in studies addressing children’s knowledge or reasoning about rights.
Some degree of caution should be exercised in terms of the generalizability of the current findings. For instance, we do not know the influence of verbal competency on
children’s ability to verbalize their knowledge about rights. There is, however, recent
evidence suggesting that developmental changes in children’s legal knowledge, a content
area not totally dissimilar to knowledge of rights, may in part be the result of age-related
changes in children’s expressive language skills (Peterson-Badali and Abramovitch,
1992). Whether verbal ability played a similar role in the present investigation remains
to be determined. In addition, the present findings should be viewed cautiously until further studies have replicated the findings with comparable as well as demographically
more diverse populations. For example, ethnic and racial minority children and adolescents, as a result of social stratification mechanisms such as racism and discrimination,
may have considerably different views of rights than the predominately non-minority
youth we interviewed.
Future research is also needed which examines the degree to which various social
contexts such as family, peers and schools influence the development of young people’s
views about rights. It seems likely that adolescents’ and children’s spontaneous knowledge of rights is as much influenced by experience as it is by general cognitive level. In
addition, based on the current data, how young people think about rights appears to
depend in part on the types of questions they are asked about rights. Future studies
addressing the degree to which children and adolescents understand the context-specific
issues surrounding the exercise of rights are also required. In addition, research is needed
which examines the relationship between young people’s knowledge and how they reason about various types of rights and rights-related situations. Finally, children’s rights
need not be at odds with adult or parental authority and responsibility. Policy-makers,
professionals and others having a stake in children’s rights must work towards developing
a framework that will ensure young people are provided with care and protection while
at the same time allowing age-appropriate opportunities for self-determination.
Acknowledgements
This research was supported in part by a Social Sciences and Humanities Research
Council of Canada Post-Doctoral Fellowship awarded to the first author. The third
author acknowledges the support of a grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities
Research Council of Canada. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the
annual meeting of the American Psychology Association, Toronto, August 1993. The
authors would like to thank Jonathan L. Freedman, Michele Peterson-Badali, Sue Elgie
and Denese Coulbeck for their assistance with this study. We also acknowledge the helpful comments and suggestions of the reviewers.
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