the stage of heteronomous morality is also known as moral realism – morality imposed from the outside. Children regard morality as obeying other people's rules and laws, which cannot be changed. They accept that all rules are made by some authority figure (e.g. parents, teacher, God), and that breaking the rules will lead to immediate and severe punishment (immanent justice). The function of any punishment is to make the guilty suffer in that the severity of the punishment should be related to severity of wrong-doing (expiatory punishment).
During this stage children consider rules as being absolute and unchanging, i.e. 'divine like'. They think that rules cannot be changed and have always been the same as they are now. Behaviour is judged as “bad” in terms of the observable consequences, regardless on the intentions or reasons for that behaviour. Therefore, a large amount of accidental damage is viewed as worse than a small amount of deliberate damage.