Ethics Program Research Articles

An Entropy/TOPSIS based Model for Financial prioritization of professional ethics teaching methods in accounting

The collapse of large corporations such as Enron and WorldCom caused much concern about the ethical behavior of accountants among users of accounting service. Ethical behavior in accounting is one of the distinguishing features of accountants, which enable them to make the best decisions for stakeholders. Professional ethics learning plays a major role in the development of ethical behavior. Also, TOPSIS method is a well-known methodology that is applied in a various decision making problems. On the other hand, in order to determine the importance of criteria, the Entropy method is known as a powerful tools. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of ethics teaching methods on the development of ethical behavior in accounting. This is done by means of an integrated Entropy/TOPSIS based Model for Financial prioritization of professional ethics teaching methods in accounting. The findings of the study showed that the variables of ethics education, style of teaching ethics and ethics textbook content respectively had a 1, 24 and 55 percent impact on the development of ethical behavior in accounting. The results of this study indicate that an ethical training program in accounting is needed to provide accountants with guidance on ethical issues and the importance of ethical standards.

Compelled to Be Ethical: Lessons Learned From the NCAA

Ethical scandals, particularly in the world of business are not a new phenomenon. However, the increase in scandals in the 21st century provoked collective agents, namely the United States government, to undertake efforts to affect a change in the ethical behavior of all businesses regardless of industry. This research looks at the history of another collective agent’s attempts to force a change in the target’s ethical behavior. The long and involved history of one of the largest ethics programs, the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) provides an interesting perspective into the influence tactics of a collective agent to affect ethical behavior of a collective target.

The problem of information hygiene and the relevance of late-antique ethics

Today a completely new type of reality – «digital reality» – is being formed, which entails new challenges for individuals and society. Deep involvement in digital reality and the active use of its technical mediators creates a load on the psychophysics of the individual, which, especially in the stage of active growth, not only deforms behavioral patterns, but can also influence the formation of brain structures. Educational practices, through which society helped the individual to form their identity, lose their former certainty in the digital dimension. As a response to these challenges at the turn of the XX-XXI centuries, the concept of information hygiene was formed within the medical sciences, describing ways to minimize the destructive effects of the information environment. However, developed for a narrow field, this concept does not take into account the fact that psychophysical transformations under the influence of destructive influences of modern media threaten to destroy the basic constants of the human body. Positivist medicine, due to the specificity of its subject, does not see the eschatological horizon of the problem, on which the contours of our «posthuman future» are already clearly outlined. At this point, philosophy can and should recall that at the dawn of European civilization, medicine was inseparably an ethical program: a single set of practices – ascetic, hygienic, and mental-aimed not only at minimizing destructive influences but also at discovering and cultivating the individual's own humanity. Thus, in this article, the concept of information hygiene is thematized taking into account its historical and philosophical implications. On the one hand, it is intended to reflect the current specifics of the challenges, on the other – to take into account the experience of preventing destructive influences, practiced by late-antique philosophers in the status of «healers of the soul». For the empirical verification of this concept, the authors performed the following experiment. A group of first-year students were asked to spend a day without the Internet and describe their feelings and thoughts. The analysis of spontaneous ways to overcome deep involvement in digital reality allowed us to identify the most adequate forms of minimizing its destructive influences: avoidance of active leisure in the real world. These forms were in tune with the late-antique practices of self-care in the editorial office of the Epicurean school. This broader ethical consideration of information hygiene opens the way for theming a comprehensive approach to the problem of human survival in the face of digital reality

Designing, implementing and evaluation of educational program of ethics in education by scenario based discussion: A Scholarship study

Introduction: The commitment of faculty members to observe ethical principles and values in the role of a model leads to the strengthening of ethics in students and consequently the development of ethics in society. Therefore, universities need to promote and effectively teach ethics to their professors. Methods: The present intervention study was designed, implemented and evaluated in the form of a scholarly activity following the Kern curriculum model. Initially, after reviewing the studies and needs assessment, the course objectives, educational content and teaching strategy were determined. Then, ten training sessions were held with a discussion-based teaching method based on real scenarios. All discussions in the classrooms were recorded and implemented. At the end of each session, participants were asked to submit scenarios based on their personal experiences. For evaluation, the number of participants and scenarios were evaluated and the discussions were analyzed and interpreted by content analysis. Result: Data analysis confirmed the presence of 110 faculty members and the submission of 32 scenarios. In the qualitative section, 194 initial codes were extracted in four main categories: "commitment to teaching and student learning ", "ethics as law", "ethics-oriented educational atmosphere" and "teacher role model". Conclusion: Considering the welcome of the faculty members and the extraction of key concepts, It is suggested to use this teaching method in the ability of professors to understand the principles of ethics in education, create moral sensitivity and strengthen moral decisions.

Student and teacher outcomes from participating in a Philosophy for Children program: Volunteer ethics teachers’ perspectives

<p class="Body">Despite the growth of philosophy for/with children (P4C) over the last five decades, its legitimacy remains contested. Key themes within the P4C literature are the potential learning outcomes for children as well as possible personal and professional development benefits for those that teach it. The literature on the former, while extensive, presents a mixed picture and highlights the challenges inherent in determining the impact of P4C on learning outcomes. The literature on the latter, while little explored, may provide valuable insights for teacher professional development. Unlike much of the literature, this paper examines the impact of P4C from the P4C educators’ perspective. The paper presents the findings from a pilot study of volunteer teachers with the Primary Ethics program in Sydney, Australia. Two key findings emerged. First, ethics teachers felt they were making a material and positive difference to the children they taught, which included: the development of critical thinking and reasoning skills; increased confidence to express themselves; and enjoyment derived from class discussions. Second, teachers that use a philosophical and a community of inquiry approach with their students may themselves become more reflective and engage in critical thinking and ethical reasoning.

Compliance Programs as Organizational Solutions to Corruption: A Literature Review

Compliance programs are promoted as effective solutions to corruption in organizations. Compliance programs, also known as ethics and compliance programs, ethics programs, and integrity programs, are widely adopted by organizations across the world, but their ability to effectively curb corruption is largely disputed. Current research mainly focuses on compliance programs as sets of organizational self-regulatory practices dissociated from wider country and sectoral anti-corruption initiatives. This article reviews and critiques the multidisciplinary literature on compliance programs. The literature reveals that anti-corruption regulation is the main driver of compliance programs, but little attention is paid to corruption as the organizational issue that compliance programs are expected to solve. This review discusses how compliance practices are informed by two dominant theoretical approaches to explaining corruption (based on principal-agent theory and collective action theory) and the implications for research and organizational practice. This review concludes by proposing a shift towards situated, problem-driven organizational strategies that take into account the challenge to tackling specific instances of corruption, the processual character of compliance programs, and the interplay of social structure and individual agency in different phases of the process of design, implementation, and maintenance of such programs.

Health care ethics programs in U.S. Hospitals: results from a National Survey

BackgroundAs hospitals have grown more complex, the ethical concerns they confront have grown correspondingly complicated. Many hospitals have consequently developed health care ethics programs (HCEPs) that include far more than ethics consultation services alone. Yet systematic research on these programs is lacking.MethodsBased on a national, cross-sectional survey of a stratified sample of 600 US hospitals, we report on the prevalence, scope, activities, staffing, workload, financial compensation, and greatest challenges facing HCEPs.ResultsAmong 372 hospitals whose informants responded to an online survey, 97% of hospitals have HCEPs. Their scope includes clinical ethics functions in virtually all hospitals, but includes other functions in far fewer hospitals: ethical leadership (35.7%), regulatory compliance (29.0%), business ethics (26.2%), and research ethics (12.6%). HCEPs are responsible for providing ongoing ethics education to various target audiences including all staff (77.0%), nurses (59.9%), staff physicians (49.0%), hospital leadership (44.2%), medical residents (20.3%) and the community/general public (18.4%). HCEPs staff are most commonly involved in policy work through review of existing policies but are less often involved in development of new policies. HCEPs have an ethics representative in executive leadership in 80.5% of hospitals, have representation on other hospital committees in 40.7%, are actively engaged in community outreach in 22.6%, and lead large-scale ethics quality improvement initiatives in 17.7%. In general, major teaching hospitals and urban hospitals have the most highly integrated ethics programs with the broadest scope and greatest number of activities. Larger hospitals, academically affiliated hospitals, and urban hospitals have significantly more individuals performing HCEP work and significantly more individuals receiving financial compensation specifically for that work. Overall, the most common greatest challenge facing HCEPs is resource shortages, whereas underutilization is the most common greatest challenge for hospitals with fewer than 100 beds. Respondents’ strategies for managing challenges include staff training and additional funds.ConclusionsWhile this study must be cautiously interpreted due to its limitations, the findings may be useful for understanding the characteristics of HCEPs in US hospitals and the factors associated with these characteristics. This information may contribute to exploring ways to strengthen HCEPs.

Reproductive carrier screening: responding to the eugenics critique

Reproductive genetic carrier screening (RCS), when offered to anyone regardless of their family history or ancestry, has been subject to the critique that it is a form of eugenics. Eugenics...

Perceptions of laboratory animal facility managers regarding institutional transparency.

Institutions that conduct animal research are often obliged to release some information under various legal or regulatory frameworks. However, within an institution, perspectives on sharing information with the broader public are not well documented. Inside animal facilities, managers exist at the interface between the people who conduct animal research and those charged with providing care for those animals. Their perception of transparency may influence their interpretation of the institutional culture of transparency and may also influence others who use these facilities. The objective of our study was to describe perceptions of transparency among animal research facility managers (all working within the same ethical oversight program), and how these perceptions influenced their experiences. Semi-structured, open-ended interviews were used to describe perceptions and experiences of 12 facility managers relating to animal research transparency. Four themes emerged from the participant interviews: 1) communication strategies, 2) impact on participant, 3) expectations of transparency, and 4) institutional policies. Similarities and differences regarding perceptions of transparency existed among participants, with notable differences between participants working at university versus hospital campuses. These results illustrate differences in perceptions of transparency within one institutional animal care and use program. We conclude that institutions, regulators and the public should not assume a uniform interpretation of a culture of transparency among managers, and that sustained communication efforts are required to support managers and to allow them to develop shared perspectives.

The effects of an ethical empowerment program on nurses’ ability of ethical care delivery to patients with decreased level of consciousness in intensive care unit

Background: Nurses should be empowered for ethical care delivery (ECD) to patients with decreased level of consciousness (LOC) in the intensive care unit (ICU). However, there are limited data about the effects of ethical empowerment programs on nurses’ ECD ability. Objectives: The aim of this study was to evaluate the effects of an ethical empowerment program on nurses’ ability of ECD to patients with decreased LOC in ICU. Methods: This quazi‐experimental study was conducted in 2019 in Al‐Zahra University Hospital, Isfahan, Iran. Seventy‐two nurses were randomly recruited from the ICUs and randomly allocated to an intervention and a control group. Participants in the intervention group were provided with an ethical empowerment program. A researcher‐made questionnaire was used to measure participants’ ability of ECD to patients with decreased LOC at three time points, namely before, immediately after, and 1 month after the workshop. Data were analyzed through the Chi‐square test, the independent‐samples t‐test, and the repeated‐measures analysis of variance. Results: The difference between the intervention and the control groups respecting the pretest mean score of ECD ability was not statistically significant (124 ± 5.88 vs. 126.17 ± 9.07; P = 0.10). However, the mean score of ECD ability in the intervention group was significantly greater than the control group both immediately after the workshop (142.58 ± 7.22 vs. 127.14 ± 8.13; P < 0.001) and 1 month after the workshop (147.57 ± 5.45 vs. 128.51 ± 9.52; P < 0.001). Conclusion: Ethical empowerment is effective in significantly improving nurses’ ability of ECD to patients with decreased LOC in ICU. This program is recommended for improving nurses’ ECD ability.

Ethical policy management processes research on the example of Ukrainian universities

The article considers the processes of development and implementation of ethical policy in higher education institutions on the examples of Ukrainian universities. The aim of the study is effectiveness assessing of management processes for ethical policy implementation in domestic universities. The object of the research is the twenty top-rated universities in Ukraine, according to the 2021 Consolidated Rating of Higher Education Institutions. In the proposed study, the method of content analysis was used for analysis of regulatory documents in the field of ethical policy of selected universities. The analysis focuses on the proposed basic criteria that characterize the effectiveness of the ethical policy implementation, namely, on availability: approved ethical programs; an officials responsible for implementing programs; ethical training; feedback systems; developed motivational mechanisms; ethical audit procedures; procedures for reviewing ethical programs. As a result of the study, problems are identified related to the implementation of ethical policies that are specific to the universities in question, namely: the formalistic nature of ethical programs, the lack of responsible persons for the policies implementation (ethical officers), the focus of ethical trainings solely on improving academic integrity, the lack of effective feedback systems, refusal to use employee motivation systems to comply with ethical standards, the lack of ethical audit, the lack of procedures for verifying the ethical standards of new employees. The elements of ethical policy management, which will allow its effective implementation in domestic universities, are proposed. The study should help the university management corps to use ethics more effectively as a management tool.

The 2021 FASEB virtual Catalyst Conference on Transplantation Genomics: Ethics of Research and Clinical Applications, January 27, 2021.

The 2021 FASEB virtual Catalyst Conference on Transplantation Genomics: Ethics of Research and Clinical Applications, January 27, 2021.

Structural Justice Ethics in Health Care

Structural Justice Ethics in Health Care

The Effect of Applying Ethical Training on the Performance of Salesmen: Applied to Some Egyptian Hotels

The research aims to determine the impact of the application of ethical training programs on the sales performance of salesmen (quantitative performance; qualitative performance), while identifying the most important obstacles facing Egyptian hotels in implementing ethical training and its impact on the performance of salesmen. It was applied to a random sample of sales and training managers in five-star hotels in Sharm El-Sheikh and Cairo. The data was collected through a pre-prepared questionnaire as a tool to measure the relationship and influence between the research variables. The statistical analysis program SPSS version 26 was used to analyze the data and test the study hypotheses. Among the results of the study, there is a strong positive effect between the application of ethical training programs and the sales performance of salesmen. The results also showed that there are obstacles in Egyptian hotels that prevent the application of these training programs that negatively affect the performance of salesmen. Considering these results, the study recommended paying attention to an ethical training approach for building a positive image of the hotel, by building trust and credibility with current and potential customers.

Beyond the entrepreneur society: Foucault, neoliberalism and the critical attitude

Michel Foucault’s The Birth of Biopolitics is generally acknowledged as a pioneering study of neoliberalism, presenting it not merely as an economic theory but also as a mode of government. There is much debate, however, on Foucault’s intentions in analysing neoliberalism and the place of the genealogy in his broader critical project. The Birth of Biopolitics itself lacks both an explicit judgement of neoliberalism and an explicit ethical program. In this article, I maintain that Foucault’s genealogical work on neoliberalism is complementary to his notions of agency. From this perspective, Foucault’s genealogy is not a judgement of neoliberalism in terms of right or wrong but rather serves as a breeding ground for ethical conduct. The notion of the critical attitude in particular shows that Foucault’s genealogical work stands in the service of the subject’s autonomy. However, Foucault is reluctant to fill in his ethical program too much because it should gain substance only in local struggles and through the subject’s own considerations.

Ethical Leadership Educational Program for Head Nurses and its Influence on Staff Nurses Organizational Pride

Ethical Leadership Educational Program for Head Nurses and its Influence on Staff Nurses Organizational Pride

Vibration, Difference, and Solidarity in the Anthropocene

Taking the new materialist and climate change themes of Ashley Fure’s The Force of Things: an Opera for Objects as a departure point, this article examines sound studies’ recent invocations of new materialist philosophy alongside this philosophy's foundational concern toward the Anthropocene ecological crisis. I argue that new materialist sonic thought retraces new materialism’s dubious ethical program by deriving equivalencies of moral standing from logically prior ontological equivalencies of material entities and social actors rooted in their shared capacities to vibrate. Some sonic thought thus amplifies what scholars in Black and Indigenous decolonial critique have exposed as the homogenizing, assimilative character of new materialism’s superficially inclusional and optimistic ontological imaginary, which includes tendencies to obscure the ongoingness of racial inequality and settler-colonial exploitation in favor of theorizing difference as a superfice or illusion. As I argue in a sonic reading of Frantz Fanon’s Black Skin, White Masks, some of new materialism’s favored analytical and ecological terms such as objecthood, vibrationality, and connection to the Earth are also terms through which anti-Blackness, colonial desire, and the universalization of Whiteness have historically been routed. This historical amnesia in new materialism enables its powerfully obfuscating premises. As a result, I argue that new materialist sound studies and philosophy risk amplifying the Anthropocene’s similarly homogenizing rhetorics, which often propound a mythic planetary oneness while concealing racial and colonial climate inequities. If sound studies and the sonic arts are to have illuminating perspectives on the Anthropocene, they must oppose rather than affirm its homogenizing logics.

Postscript

Postscript

Introducing the Conference

This collection of papers aims to capture the dynamic exchanges that filled the days of March 10–11, 2019, in Philadelphia, at a conference called “Jewish Values and the Ethical Now” celebrating Rabbi David A. Teutsch, PhD.While the now is always a moving target, it is hard to image two years that could have more swiftly and profoundly upended our moorings in time and space. The “now” of those conference days increasingly feels locked in a time apart, a time of warm handshakes and hugs, of excited conversation over coffee, of crowded auditoriums stilled in rapt attention. The writings gathered here serve as a good reminder, however, that in the realm of the ethical, the timeless and the timely are never really so far apart. With all that has changed in the past two years, the insights and arguments within this volume retain their relevance and their urgency.Some of the contributors made significant changes to their conference presentations, converting their spoken words into the forms of learned writing for this publication. Others have preserved the oral idiom of their presentations, trying to condense on paper the immediacy of the original encounter. Born of real-time conversation, it is my hope that all the contributions can now seed further exchange, that this issue of JJE will find its way to many thoughtful readers who will study these pieces and talk about them.In addition to the contributors whose words appear here, many others came together to make the March 2019 conference possible, both behind the scenes and in conference sessions. Conference presenters included Julia Watts Belser, Jonathan Crane, Katie Day, Amy Eilberg, David Ellenson, Laurence Hoffman, Georgette Kennebrae, Nancy Fuchs Kreimer, Asher Lopatin, Ruth Messinger, Louis E. Newman, Toba Spitzer, Jacob Staub, Elsie Stern, Deborah Waxman, Paul Root Wolpe, and Laurie Zimmerman. Conference planners included Jonathan Crane, Marsha Friedman, Diana Phillips, Rory Schonning, Jacob Staub, and Elsie Stern. The generosity of David's friends Daniel Levin and Fay Hartog-Levin established the Levin-Lieber Family Program in Jewish Ethics at the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, supporting this conference and the program's ongoing initiatives. All of these and so many more colleagues, friends, and students join me in honoring the ongoing ethical teaching and moral leadership of Rabbi David A. Teutsch, PhD.

Toward a global strategy for seabird tracking

AbstractElectronic tracking technologies revolutionized wildlife ecology, notably for studying the movements of elusive species such as seabirds. Those advances are key to seabird conservation, for example in guiding the design of marine protected areas for this highly threatened group. Tracking data are also boosting scientific understanding of marine ecosystem dynamics in the context of global change. To optimize future tracking efforts, we performed a global assessment of seabird tracking data. We identified and mined 689 seabird tracking studies, reporting on &gt; 28,000 individuals of 216 species from 17 families over the last four decades. We found substantial knowledge gaps, reflecting a historical neglect of tropical seabird ecology, with biases toward species that are heavier, oceanic, and from high‐latitude regions. Conservation status had little influence on seabird tracking propensity. We identified 54 threatened species for which we did not find published tracking records, and 19 with very little data. Additionally, much of the existing tracking data are not yet available to other researchers and decision‐makers in online databases. We highlight priority species and regions for future tracking efforts. More broadly, we provide guidance toward an ethical, rational, and efficient global tracking program for seabirds, as a contribution to their conservation.