In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women’s Development

Gilligan discusses an infamous dilemma created by Kohlberg to measure moral development in adolescents: A man named Heinz must decide whether or not to steal a drug he cannot afford in order to save the life of his wife.

Gilligan analyzes two responses, one from an 11-year-old boy, Jake, and one from an 11-year-old girl, Amy. Jake sees the problem the same way Kohlberg sees it, as a “conflict between the properties of value and life” (26 ). Following this train of thought, Jake determines that the property of life should trump that of property and that the “only thing that is totally logical” (26) is to steal the drug. He believes, too, that a judge would understand the need for the theft.

Amy’s answer, however, does not see the dilemma in the same terms that Kohlberg (or Jake) does. Instead, she sees a “narrative of relations that extends over time” (28), questioning the leading question “should he steal the drug?” with an entirely different approach that involves a discussion with the pharmacist, a possible alternative way of making the money, and a reluctance to endorse theft due to the husband possibly being imprisoned and therefore being unable to care for his wife. As the interview continues, the interviewer attempts to get Amy back “on track,” returning to the either/or question of theft. Amy’s approach, which assumes people in relation to one another rather than existing within individual rights (e.g., the right to live, the right to property), is thus undermined, and she becomes increasingly unsure of herself.

Both Jake and Amy agree that the wife needs the medicine, but Jake approaches the question of how to obtain the medicine through impersonal systems of logic and law and Amy through personal ones of relation and discussion. Amy’s approach is assessed as lower on the moral developmental scale. The interviewer only sees an evasion of the dilemma on Amy’s part. Gilligan argues, however, that Amy’s approach might actually be a search for a more substantive and sustainable solution than the one imagined by Kohlberg.

When Amy and Jake are asked about potential conflicts in responsibility toward self and other, Jake’s answer is grounded in an attempt to limit interference in others’ lives. Again, the goal is to let others be. Amy’s response, however, is not concerned with a limitation of interference but with an extension of care. Amy assumes connection, and then she begins to explore separation; Jake assumes separation and independence and then begins to explore connection. Development for girls, in general, does not proceed out of individuation.

Gilligan conducted research with Susan Pollak on images of violence in stories written by college students, where they found “themes of separation and connection” (39) as central to whether a scene was interpreted as violent or not. Men were more likely to read violence into scenes of affiliation than into scenes of personal success. For men in the study, violence was associated with intimacy. “If aggression is perceived as the response to danger” (42), then the study suggests that men and women see danger as occurring in different situations, with each sex perceiving danger where the other sex perceives security.

For example, given an image of two trapeze artists, one female research subject creates a story that inserts a safety net under the two artists, which Gilligan contrasts with a male subject’s story of the woman betraying her husband, her trapeze partner’s best friend. Right before the show the male artist finds out about her betrayal and purposely drops his partner and best friend’s wife, killing her, but feeling no guilt. Gilligan claims that “women in their fantasies create nets of safety where men depict annihilation” (45).

In Civilization and Its Discontents, Freud traces the development of the idea of self from the infant’s frustration with external sources. In the infant’s cry—and desire for the mother’s breast—comes the separation of ego from the outside world and the sense of others as sources of gratification. Sensations of gratification are located inside the self, and the sources of those gratifications are located outside the self. This differentiation of self initiates the “search for autonomy” (46), the desire to gain control over outside sources while protecting oneself from loss. This “line of defense” (46), which Freud sees as the foundation for civilization, finds exception in maternal relationships, which are based in connection. Women’s experiences, in general, are anomalies (rather than foundational) to Freud.

Gilligan concludes with a discussion of the damage that the marginalization of women’s voices does to individual women, who doubt their ways of approaching the world, with this doubt making counseling of them even more difficult. Gilligan concludes the chapter by pointing out that “these disparate visions in their tension reflect the paradoxical truths of human experience—that we know ourselves as separate only insofar as we live in connection with others, and that we experience relationship only insofar as we differentiate other from self” (63).