Perspectives on Character Virtue Development

Abstract

For more than 2,000 years philosophers have been captivated by the nature of an individual’s character (Aristotle, 350 BC/1999). How is character defined? What attributes or dispositions constitute a person’s character? Is character stable over time or is it subject to change? As philosophers toiled over these questions, the field of psychology remained silent on the subject until the 20th century. Since the early 1900s, however, and especially in the past two decades, there has been a renewed interest in the conceptualization, measurement, and translation into educational programs of research on character from a psychological perspective.