Culture and collective argumentation

What are the mechanisms underlying the reproduction and change of collective beliefs? The paper suggests that a productive and promising approach for dealing with this question can be found in ontogenetic and cross-cultural studies on ‘collective argumentations and belief systems’; this is illustrated with regard to moral beliefs: After a short discussion of the rationality/relativity issue in cultural anthropology some basic elements of a conceptual framework for the empirical study of collective argumentations are outlined. A few empirical case studies are summarized; the results deliver some empirical evidence to the assumption that as the ‘logic of collective argumentations’ develops in children and adolescent there will be different and increasingly more complex constraints on the kinds of basic moral beliefs that can be collectively accepted. Most importantly, as children approach adolescence they may have acquired a ‘logic of argumentation’ which makes possible a collectively valid distinction between the ‘is’ and the ‘ought’ of some disputed particular moral issue. A comparison with a land litigation among Trobriands (Papua New Guinea) shows that the ‘logic of argumentation’ and the corresponding basic moral beliefs of Trobriands very much resemble the ‘logic of argumentation’ and moral rationality standards of (German) adolescents.     

Dual processes of emotion and reason in judgments about moral dilemmas

We report the results of two experiments that show that participants rely on both emotion and reason in moral judgments. Experiment 1 showed that when participants were primed to communicate feelings, they provided emotive justifications not only for personal dilemmas, e.g., pushing a man from a bridge that will result in his death but save the lives of five others, but also for impersonal dilemmas, e.g., hitting a switch on a runaway train that will result in the death of one man but save the lives of five others; when they were primed to communicate thoughts, they provided non-emotive justifications for both personal and impersonal dilemmas. Experiment 2 showed that participants read about a protagonist's emotions more quickly when the protagonist was faced with a personal dilemma than an impersonal one, but they read about the protagonist's decision to act or not act equally quickly for personal and impersonal dilemmas.     

Application of Child Protective Services in Korea

Abstract

Because childrearing is a very culturally oriented practice, cultural sensitivity in Child Protective Services (CPS) is a very important factor for effective services. Korea has recently begun social intervention in cases of child abuse, but faces many difficulties resulting from cultural dilemmas. In particular, Korean society has the value of corporal punishment and negative attitudes toward social intervention into family issues. These cultural characteristics result in strong resistance to intervention by CPS. In the future, the success of child abuse intervention in Korean society will depend on how these cultural dilemmas are resolved. The development of a CPS model based on Korean culture can be an alternative to reduce conflicts in the application of CPS.     

Care and Justice in Real-Life Moral Reasoning

Moral reasoning of 57 (Time 1) and 59 (Time 2) nursing, social-work and law-enforcement students was investigated in terms of care and justice reasoning about hypothetical and real-life dilemmas. The analysis methods were the Ethic of Care Interview, the Moral Judgment Interview, Lyons' Moral Orientation Scheme and Wark and Krebs' classification of real-life dilemmas. The type of dilemma predicted moral orientation usage. Prosocial dilemmas pulled for care and antisocial dilemmas for justice orientation. Level of justice reasoning varied according to the type of dilemma. Real-life care reasoning was consistent with participants' competence, with the exception of transgression-type dilemmas at Time 2. Levels of care and justice reasoning were highly correlated with each other. These results underscore the importance of the dilemma type and suggest that care reasoning is a significant part of real life morality. The study recommends the ECI as a new model to account for real-life care reasoning.     

Emotional engagement in professional ethics

Recent results from two different studies show evidence of strong emotional engagement in moral dilemmas that require personal involvement or ethical problems that involve significant inter-personal issues. This empirical evidence for a connection between emotional engagement and moral or ethical choices is interesting because it is related to a fundamental survival mechanism rooted in human evolution. The results lead one to question when and how emotional engagement might occur in a professional ethical situation. However, the studies employed static dilemmas or problems that offered only two choices whose outcome was certain or nearly so, whereas actual problems in professional ethics are dynamic and typically involve considerable uncertainty. The circumstances of three example cases suggest that increasing personal involvement and uncertainty could have been perceived as changes, threats, or opportunities and could therefore have elicited an emotional response as a way to ensure the reputation, integrity or success of oneself or a group to which one belongs. Such emotional engagement is only suggested and more studies and experiments are required to better characterize the role of emotional engagement in professional ethics.     

Moral Dilemmas and Offence

In 1963 Roderick Chisholm proposed a category of acts called “offences” to capture what he called acts of “permissive ill-doing.” Chisholm’s proposal has proven to be controversial. Here I propose that some progress can be made in validating acts of offence by focusing upon moral dilemmas. Given the problems which have been alleged to beset moral dilemmas, this may initially seem like a puzzling strategy. However, I will call attention to a type of moral dilemma unlike what is standardly discussed in the literature and attempt to show that those who acknowledge that such dilemmas are possible are likewise obliged to acknowledge that acts of offence are possible. My suggestion, then, is that, since the former are plausible to acknowledge, so are the latter.     

Ethical Issues in Cancer Genetics: 1) Whose Information Is It?

This article presents and discusses four clinical cases that exemplify the complexity of ethical dilemmas concerning the provider's obligation to disclose or withhold genetic information from patients. Case 1: What is the responsibility of the cancer genetics provider to ensure that a positive test results is shared with distant relatives? Case 2: To ensure that results go to at-risk relatives, do we have the right to ignore the wishes of the designated next-of-kin? Case 3: Do we have the right to reveal a familial BRCA1 mutation to a patient's relative, who is at 50% risk? Case 4: Do we have an obligation to reveal that a patient is not a blood relative and therefore, not at risk to have inherited a familial mutation? These cases form the basis for discussing the provider's dual obligations to keeping patient confidentiality and informing patients and families about risk (i.e. duty to warn). We also provide a summary of consensus points and additional discussion questions for each case.     

A Study of the Ethical Dilemmas Experienced by School Psychologists in Portugal

This study examines the ethical dilemmas and difficulties encountered by Portuguese school psychologists. As part of a larger survey, participants were asked about ethical issues faced in daily practice and asked to describe ethical incidents. Of the 477 respondents, 274 reported 441 ethically troubling or challenging situations. Responses were coded into a six-category system based on the code of ethics of Portuguese psychologists. Most of the reported dilemmas concerned privacy and confidentiality principles (53%). Results are discussed in light of relevant literature and international findings. Implications for the development of the profession and future research are provided.     

Why and when justice sensitivity leads to pro- and antisocial behavior

People differ in how injustice-sensitive they are either as victims or as observers. Whereas observer sensitivity is positively related to cooperative behavior, victim sensitivity promotes antisocial and egoistic behavior. The present article investigates the dynamics underlying these effects. Participants played an online-based public goods game and were informed about the number of people who violated a fairness rule in previous rounds of the game (no, some, or many violators). High victim-sensitive participants contributed less to the public good even in the “some violators” condition. High observer-sensitive participants contributed more to the public good even in the “many violators” condition. The findings correspond with the sensitivity to mean intentions model and cannot be explained by individual differences in general trust.