Nathan Canney

Cultivating an understanding of ethical responsibilities and the societal impacts of technology is increasingly recognized as an important component in undergraduate engineering curricula. There is growing research on how ethics-related topics are taught and outcomes are attained, especially in the context of accreditation criteria. However, there...

Ethical reasoning is an important ability for engineers working with marginalized communities in global contexts. However, the ethical awareness and development that are critical for this work may not be included in traditional engineering education. This paper presents faculty perspectives on the ethical and societal issues (ESI) that should be ta...

This research characterized faculty perceptions about the role of cocurricular activities in educating civil engineering students about ethics and/or the societal impacts of engineering (ESI). Among all survey respondents—those who mentored cocurricular activities and those who did not—41% believed that undergraduate students in their program learn...

Personal reflections integrated into teaching and assessment practices are becoming somewhat more common in engineering education. Reflections may be particularly effective as part of ethics education, to increase engineering students’ moral development and critical thinking about ethical issues. On a large survey, 48% of 1122 engineering educators...

This research paper explored student perspectives on a micro-insertion of an ethics and societal impacts (ESI) intervention into three courses, using qualitative data collected in focus groups. An intervention examining hydraulic fracturing from different perspectives (e.g., economic, political, environmental) was incorporated into a required, foun...

Full paper available from ASEE peer at: DOI 10.18260/1-2--34206 Permanent URL: https://peer.asee.org/34206 Abstract It is important that engineering and computing students are educated to understand the ethical expectations of the profession and to consider the broader impacts of their work (termed ethics and societal issues, ESI). However, asses...

Curricular and co-curricular service programs are becoming more common in engineering education. For some students, these experiences align with preexisting desires to use engineering to help others; for others it instills these expectations for one’s career. There has been a lack of research on the long-term impacts of these service experiences on...

This research explored disciplinary differences in the ethics and societal impact (ESI) topics taught to engineering and computing students. Differences were predicted based on the codes of ethics of professional societies and educational guidelines. Among 917 online survey responses from engineering/computing educators across 13 disciplines, diffe...

This research explored if and how global interests and experiences relate to engineering students’ ideas of professional social responsibility. The mixed-methods study included quantitative information from about 3300 students who completed online surveys and qualitative information from both open-ended questions on the surveys and longitudinal int...

It is important that engineering and computing students are educated to understand the ethical expectations of the profession and to consider the broader impacts of their work (termed ethics and societal issues, ESI). However, assessment methods related to these outcomes that rely on Likert-type responses or structured assignments may be susceptibl...

This research paper presents the development of a survey for students based on the four-domain development diagram (4DDD) by Vanasupa and others [1]. There are many challenges for engineering faculty to successfully incorporate ethics education into their courses and programs. Lack of formal training in ethics among engineering faculty, limited spa...

Learning in higher education occurs in many forms, through the official written lessons in the curriculum, the informal conversations and interactions in academic settings, and the tacit messages and attitudes of the organization and culture, from either internal or external sources. The last component, termed the hidden curriculum, pertains to per...

This research aims to increase our understanding of institutional variations on the education of undergraduate engineering/computing students about ethics and societal impacts (ESI). In alignment with Input-Environment-Output models and Lattuca and Stark’s Academic Plan Model, it was expected that differences in institutional cultures could manifes...

This research explored the perspectives of engineering students on the relationship between service in the military and views of social responsibility as engineers, in particular professional connectedness or the obligation that an engineer has to help solve social problems or help others using their professional skills. Three research questions (R...

Students must be taught to understand the ethical issues associated with engineering and technology, which includes microethics and macroethics. This research examined the influence of cultural environment by comparing ethics-related education outcomes between educators in (1) the United States, (2) non-US Anglo, and (3) Western European countries...

Teaching students about ethical responsibilities and the societal impacts of engineering (ESI) is an important part of undergraduate education. Despite the inclusion of these topics in accreditation criteria, professional codes of ethics, and engineering bodies of knowledge, there is little consensus on the most effective approach to educating stud...

The question of what comprises effective engineering ethics education is intriguing and complex. Broadly, this research is attempting to identify strong models for macroethics education, so-called “exemplars”. A large national survey of educators of engineering and computing students found that the majority believed that undergraduate and graduate...

The new ABET EAC accreditation outcomes recognize the importance of educating students about their ethical and professional responsibilities, and how these relate to the impact of engineering in societal and environmental contexts. This research explored how the educators of chemical engineering students viewed the sufficiency of education on ethic...

This research explored the extent that working engineers were satisfied with their ability to help or serve people and/or society through their jobs. Over 450 engineering graduates responded to an online survey, including alumni recently transitioning to the workforce from 16 U.S. institutions and professional volunteers with Engineers Without Bord...

This research explores the ethics education of engineering and computing students, reported by faculty, in light of diversity issues. A national online survey with approximately 1,400 responses provided quantitative data for the study. Among the individuals who taught ethics in their courses, 33% were women, much higher than their 16% representatio...

This research characterized how faculty educate environmental engineering (EnvE) undergraduate and graduate students on ethical and societal issues (ESI), in comparison to civil, chemical, and mechanical engineering (CCM). In a national survey, responses from 158 instructors of EnvE students representing 114 institutions were received, and compared...

The literature does not include a good synthesis of how ethics, particularly macroethical issues, are integrated into the education of computing versus engineering students. Survey responses from faculty who teach computing students (n=188) were compared to other engineering disciplines (n=1161). The most common topics taught by the computing respo...

Integrating ethical and social impacts (ESI) across the curriculum, and in particular into core engineering courses, might be particularly impactful to teach students to consider these issues and to value them on par with technical skills. About 1400 faculty from 400 institutions responded to a survey indicating where they believed undergraduate st...

A survey was conducted to explore ethics education in biomedical engineering programs in the United States. More than 100 responses were received from individuals representing about half of all Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET) Engineering Accreditation Commission (EAC)–accredited biomedical engineering programs, and additio...

Previous studies have found that engineering students can learn about ethics, both microethical and macroethical, through service-learning courses and co-curricular community engagements. This research has sought to generate a national picture through survey responses of how ethical issues are taught in these settings. Based on survey results, indi...

This research explored how engineering student views of their responsibility toward helping individuals and society through their profession, so-called social responsibility, change over time. A survey instrument was administered to students initially primarily in their first year, senior year, or graduate studies majoring in mechanical, civil, or...

This work-in-progress examines an attempt to develop reflective habits in engineering students, towards engendering life-long reflective practices. The intervention was designed to implement theoretical frameworks of reflection in engineering education and self-regulated learning. The theory of reflection used is based on five elements of reflectiv...

Ethical awareness and decision-making are important skills for graduating engineers transitioning into professional practice and for engineering education accreditation. Ethics instruction can target microethics which focuses on individual projects and topics such as safety, and macroethics which covers larger ethical topics in the field of enginee...

The development of social responsibility is important for educating holistic engineers, able to work across social and cultural boundaries to solve complex social issues. A way is needed to measure effective interventions for increasing social responsibility. This article describes the Engineering Professional Responsibility Assessment (EPRA) instr...

This study explored the aspirations of undergraduate engineering students in regard to helping others, examining potential differences between disciplines and institutions. Over 1900 undergraduate students from 17 U.S. universities responded to a survey in spring 2014. In open-ended responses, 15.5% of the students included some form of helping peo...

This research explored the social responsibility (SR) attitudes of engineering students with respect to their self-reported religious beliefs and the religious affiliation of their institution. The study measured SR attitudes using 50 items on a 7-point Likert metric. Over 1900 responses were received in spring 2014 from undergraduate engineering s...

For the past 27 years the capstone program in the College of Science and Engineering at Seattle University has required all engineering students to complete a nine month long, team based, externally sponsored capstone design project. The Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering has completed nearly 150 projects since the program's inceptio...

Modern engineering education sits at the intersection of diverse, complex and sometimes competing voices about the general need for more engineers and what skills those engineers should possess. Many are calling for the education of holistic engineers in order to address complex social issues being faced today (National Academy of Engineering, 2004...

This paper presents results from engineering student responses to the open ended question “Write a few sentences explaining how you define `Social Responsibility'.” Through emergent coding methods it was found that students were most likely to use a disassociated, third person voice in their definitions, as opposed to a first person voice where the...

The purpose of this study was to examine differences in student views of social responsibility by discipline, looking at student reasons for their choice of discipline and online messaging as possible explanations for differences. Civil, environmental, and mechanical engineering students at five universities were surveyed regarding their views of s...

Project-based learning pedagogies have been shown to be effective at teaching many of the technical and professional skills desired of engineering education programs. They allow students to engage in more authentic engineering designs, helping to develop the technical and professional skills. This type of approach, however, makes traditional assess...

This paper presents the Professional Social Responsibility Development Model, which is a framework to help understand the development of personal and professional social responsibility in engineers. Social responsibility is seen as a foundational disposition that informs how engineers relate to many professional skills valued in engineering includi...

Multiple studies point to a desire to have a positive impact on society as a strong motivator for many women to study engineering and a possible avenue to increase their attraction and retention in engineering. This study focuses on social responsibility attitudes as a differentiating element between female and male engineering students. The Engine...

Addressing how engineering students view their role in society, their social responsibility, is seen as a central aspect toward creating holistic engineers who are able to address complex social issues. The Professional Social Responsibility Development Model (PSRDM) provides a framework for social responsibility development in engineers. Included...

Many professional bodies are calling for engineering education to develop holistic engineers, trained in more than just technical content. Educational expectations include ethics and understanding social context, as well as attitudinal dispositions such as tolerance and thoughtfulness. These skills and dispositions add increased complexity and diff...

With a growing emphasis on developing holistic engineers, many engineering educators are turning to service-based pedagogies to help students gain broader perspectives of their roles as engineers in society. The explosive growth of Engineers Without Borders (EWB) and the rise of programs such as Purdue's Engineering Projects in Community Service (E...

This research explored correlations between the social responsibility attitudes of engineering students and their participation in service-learning and/or extracurricular engineering service activities, such as Engineers Without Borders (EWB). Social responsibility attitudes were measured using a survey with fifty Likert items. The survey also coll...

The goal of this research was to characterize the social responsibility (SR) attitudes of first year engineering students, determine if these attitudes changed during the first year in college, and whether students cited courses and/or volunteer activities as having impacted these views. First year students from four institutions participated in an...

The development of social responsibility, both personally and professionally, is critical in the movement toward developing more holistic engineers, as called for by many professional engineering societies to address the complex problems that face our society. This paper presents correlations between engineering students’ religious beliefs and thei...

As the engineering profession advances, there is a recognition that engineers must interact across disciplinary and cultural boundaries to successfully address complex problems. Directly or indirectly, an engineer's work affects society and therefore it is critical that they give full consideration to the relationship between the engineering profes...

This paper focuses on how students learn to become culturally responsive engineers for development within a graduate-level engineering course entitled Sustainable Community Development (SCD). A new type of engineer is required for the ever-increasing global demands to address the problems of equitable access to energy, nutrition, shelter, clean wat...

Learning Through Service (LTS) is a pedagogical method that encompasses curricular and extracurricular service learning in engineering. Though the numerous benefits of LTS are apparent to those who engage in it, the barriers are also plentiful, as evident by the reluctance of many instructors to engage in LTS. As a joint effort to create a communit...

Important attributes for engineering professionals include an understanding of the global and societal impacts of engineering projects and a well-developed professional and ethical code of responsibility; these attributes must be developed in engineering students. Furthermore, the role of an engineer is becoming increasingly global, requiring an in...

A workshop was held in 2011 with the goal of determining the best practices, benefits, and challenges of engaging in Learning Through Service (LTS) activities, with a focus on the engineering faculty perspective. LTS in engineering typically takes two forms: (1) course-based service-learning (SL) projects for real communities or individuals (such a...

A developed sense of social responsibility should be inherent in the engineering profession such that any project can be seen as service to a community. Academic institutions carry the responsibility of teaching engineering students not only technical skills but also professional skills that relate to social responsibility, such as an understanding...

Padang has one of the world's highest tsunami risks due to its high hazard, vulnerable terrain and population density. The current strategy to prepare for tsunamis in Padang is focused on developing early warning systems, planning evacuation routes, conducting evacuation drills, and raising local awareness. Although these are all necessary, they ar...

The Benjamin-Feir modulational instability effects the evolution of perturbed plane- wave solutions of the cubic nonlinear Schrodinger equation (NLS), the modified NLS, and the band-modified NLS. Recent work demonstrates that the Benjamin- Feir instability in NLS is "stabilized" when a linear term representing dissipation is added. In this paper, w...