Vol. 8, Issue 1, Part A (2026)

In today’s educational context, students frequently encounter ethical dilemmas and value conflicts, making moral instruction crucial for fostering responsible decision-making. This study explores the impact of moral instruction on the ability of ninth-grade students to make conscious moral choices in a selected school in Pune. It specifically examines decision-making across six value domains: personal, professional, social, aesthetic, humanitarian, and religious values. A descriptive survey design with a quantitative approach was employed. The sample consisted of 100 ninth-grade students, both boys and girls, who had received continuous moral instruction from the first through the ninth standard in the same school. Data were collected using a researcher-developed Moral Decision-Making Scale comprising 36 situational items with multiple response options, complemented by an opinionnaire to assess students’ perceptions of moral instruction’s influence on their decisions. Personal interviews with selected students and teachers were conducted to validate and enrich the quantitative findings. Results indicate that students exhibited varying levels of moral decision-making across different value domains, with higher levels in social, humanitarian, and professional values, and comparatively lower levels in personal and religious values. A majority of students acknowledged that moral instruction positively influenced their ability to make conscious moral decisions, although its impact differed across value areas. The study concludes that sustained, systematic moral instruction enhances moral awareness, ethical reasoning, and decision-making skills, emphasizing the importance of integrating robust moral education in secondary school curricula to foster character development and responsible citizenship.