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Virtue in Media: The Moral Psychology of U.S. Exemplars in News and Public Relations
Abstract
This study contributes to an empirical basis for media ethics theorizing by constructing a moral psychology profile of exemplars in journalism and public relations. Drawing on theories and instruments from psychology, this inductive project assesses descriptive and inferential patterns of personality traits, moral-reasoning skills, ethical ideology, and perceived workplace ethical climate among twenty-four exemplars selected for professional and ethical leadership qualities. The emerging profile suggests clear "clustering" of personality traits and an overarching emphasis on notions of care and respect for others, professional duty, concern for harm, and proactive social engagement-all of which characterize higher stages of moral development.
... There's little research to date on understanding the impact of social experience on moral reasoning. However, several studies have reported moral reasoning scores for media professionals including public relations practitioners (e.g., Coleman & Wilkins, 2009;Lieber, 2008;Plaisance, 2014Plaisance, , 2015, advertising and marketing research practitioners (e.g., Castleberry, French, & Carlin, 1993;Cunningham, 2005), journalists (e.g., Coleman & Wilkins, 2002;Plaisance, 2014Plaisance, , 2015Wilkins & Coleman, 2005a, 2005b, as well as undergraduate students of public relations and journalism (e.g., Cabot, 2005). ...
... There's little research to date on understanding the impact of social experience on moral reasoning. However, several studies have reported moral reasoning scores for media professionals including public relations practitioners (e.g., Coleman & Wilkins, 2009;Lieber, 2008;Plaisance, 2014Plaisance, , 2015, advertising and marketing research practitioners (e.g., Castleberry, French, & Carlin, 1993;Cunningham, 2005), journalists (e.g., Coleman & Wilkins, 2002;Plaisance, 2014Plaisance, , 2015Wilkins & Coleman, 2005a, 2005b, as well as undergraduate students of public relations and journalism (e.g., Cabot, 2005). ...
... Lieber concluded that moral reasoning increases in tandem with professional tenure. Plaisance (2014Plaisance ( , 2015 studied journalism and public relations practitioners in executive roles, with several years to decades of professional experience, and P scores of 51.62 (journalism) and 50.38 (public relations). ...
Guided by theories of moral psychology and social identity, one hundred and fifty-three public relations practitioners working in the United States participated in an online experiment that tested how professional identity influences moral reasoning. Professional associations appear to be a valuable resource for socialization as members of PRSA who, in addition to engaging in higher levels of moral reasoning than the average adult, report they have access to regular ethics training, ethics resources and mentors, and are familiar with their industry’s code of ethics. Socialization in later career stages appears to contribute to moral reasoning maintenance, sustaining levels of moral reasoning, rather than development.
... The varying results of moral reasoning also have been reported relative to one's profession, years of experience, and moral commitment. In media ethics scholarship, DIT scores suggest that journalists and public relations practitioners engage in higher levels of moral reasoning (e.g., Coleman and Wilkins 2002;Coleman and Wilkins 2009;Lee et al. 2016;Plaisance 2014;Wilkins and Coleman 2005b) than advertising practitioners (Cunningham 2005). For example, Coleman and Wilkins (2002) found that of all professions studied, journalists scored the fourth highest on the DIT, with a P-score of 48.17, falling only behind seminarians/philosophers (65.1), medical students (50.2), and practicing physicians (49.2). ...
... A moral exemplar is someone who sets an example for others and is characterized by moral commitment, personal integrity, standards of honesty, and selfless goals (Colby and Damon 1992). Plaisance (2014Plaisance ( , 2015 studied moral exemplars in journalism and public relations with several years to decades of professional experience. As predicted, their moral reasoning scores were higher than averages previously reported for non-exemplars, whereas journalism exemplars scored 51.62 on the DIT and public relations exemplars scored 50.38. ...
... In addition, these findings lead us to question if males, serving in leadership, management, and executive positions, denote some degree of exemplary moral behavior? Future research on moral exemplars, to extend the work of Plaisance (2014Plaisance ( , 2015, is warranted to better understand the psychological traits, professional experiences, training, and moral reasoning of leaders in advertising. ...
Moral reasoning among media professionals varies. Historically, advertising professionals score lower on the Defining Issues Test (DIT) than their media colleagues in journalism and public relations. However, the extent to which professional identity impacts media professionals’ moral reasoning has yet to be examined. To understand how professional identity influences moral reasoning, if at all, and guided by theories of moral psychology and social identity, 134 advertising practitioners working in the USA participated in an online experiment. While professional identity was not a significant predictor of moral reasoning, an interaction effect between gender and identity priming occurred. This finding suggests that we reconsider moral psychology theory’s explanatory power for media practitioners and consider how the complexity of professional identities in concert with gender and professional training, among other variables, interact to affect moral reasoning. In addition, advertising practitioners participating in this experiment scored higher on the DIT than those tested previously.
... Their research echoed what prior work (e.g., Coleman and Wilkins 2002;Westbrook 1995) had found: "Journalists consistently scored higher than adults in general and several professional groups including nurses and orthopedic surgeons, and dental and veterinary students" in moral reasoning (Coleman and Wilkins,521). Journalism and ethical behavior are so historically and intrinsically connected that Plaisance (2014Plaisance ( , 2015 felt the industry warranted a study of its "moral exemplars." But while prior "objective and quantifiable" research illustrates that journalists act and think in a more ethical manner than most segments of America (Coleman and Wilkins 2004, 511), these studies surveyed working journalists and asked them to answer questions about various scenarios but did not attempt to delink the person with the profession. ...
... Others have tested the gap between motivation and moral behavior because while journalists always score highly on ethics tests, they do not always act ethically (Lee, Coleman, and Molyneux 2016). Some have identified exemplars of ethical behavior and then attempted to understand what characteristics an ideal ethical person displays (Plaisance 2014(Plaisance , 2015. But the clear majority of scholars studying moral psychology and media ethics use the Defining Issues Test (DIT), a quantitative instrument that measures "the percentage of time that people use universal principles" of ethics (Coleman and Wilkins 2004, 513). ...
... They suggested the "cumulative impact" of the "stimulating social experiences" that come from education and professional experience are more positively tied to moral development than age (Rest et al. 1999, 125). When studying the intersection of media and moral development, communication researchers have applied the DIT to understand the moral reasoning of journalists (e.g., Wilkins 2002, 2004;Plaisance 2014Plaisance , 2015Wilkins and Coleman 2005), public relations practitioners (e.g., Coleman and Wilkins 2009;Lieber 2008;Plaisance 2014Plaisance , 2015, advertising and marketing research practitioners (e.g., Castleberry, French, and Carlin 1993;Wilkins and Coleman 2005), as well as of public relations and journalism undergraduate students (e.g., Auger and Gee 2016;Cabot 2005). ...
This study examines whether professional journalists reason differently about moral problems when primed with their professional identity. This between-subjects experiment (N = 171) used the Defining Issues Test, a much-used and validated instrument that measures moral reasoning. The results show identity priming does not affect how journalists apply ethics. The study also found that journalists score far lower in moral reasoning than they did 13 years ago. These results are interpreted through the lens of social identity theory.
... One study found that nation influenced the idealism and relativism scores of journalists in 18 countries (Plaisance, Skewes, and Hanitzsch 2012). Plaisance's (2014) study of a small group of moral exemplars in journalism and public relations found that participants tended to be highly idealistic and non-relativistic. This would place most of the exemplars in the category of absolutists. ...
... A small number of the participants were exceptionists, who had low idealism and relativism scores. None of the participants were situationists or subjectivists (Plaisance 2014). Media ethics students in the United States scored differently from the exemplars. ...
... That may be explained by the larger sample size that this study entailed. On the other hand, it may suggest the political cartoonists generally have evolved to have more diverse ethical perspectives than the people who were identified as moral exemplars in Plaisance's (2014) study. Similarly, this group reflected more diversity than the journalism students in Plaisance's (2007) study, who were primarily situationists. ...
This paper utilizes survey methodology to explore the ethical perspectives of political cartoonists following the Charlie Hebdo shootings. Ethics positions theory is considered. Participants tended to be either situationists, absolutists, or exceptionists. Political ideology was associated with relativism scores. Findings showed that most of the participants (74 percent) reported that they drew a cartoon in response to the shootings. Participants expressed feelings of anger and sadness following the shootings. They reported that they drew cartoons illustrating free speech, cartoonists, pencils and pens, or violence following the shootings.
... Notably, such encroachments impede their moral autonomy (see Bowen, 2006;Jin et al., 2018;Meng, 2014), objective ethics counseling (see Bowen, 2006;Erzikova & Bowen, 2019), and drive for moral entrepreneurship (i.e., developing novel ethical norms) (see Kaptein, 2019). In corporate misconduct, while senior management expects loyalty (Bowen, 2009;Zerfass et al., 2016a), it limits PRPs' ethical conscience (see L'Etang, 2003), inhibits their moral courage (see Plaisance, 2014) and moral activism (see Berger & Reber, 2006;Ciszek, 2015;Holzhausen, 2000;Holzhausen & Voto, 2002), which are particularly critical amid incessant false narratives, corporate misconduct, and fake news, among others. In self-identity and self-serving contexts, ethical dilemmas occur when representing and reinforcing professional values (see Adler & Kwon, 2013;Kruckeberg, 2000) conflict with those of the PRP, who, as a citizen, possesses the right to uphold and freely express their values (see Place, 2019). ...
Although scholarship discussing public relations professionals’ roles has been abundant, ethical dilemmas facing public relations professionals remain implicit in such roles. Specifically, a theoretically-derived typology explaining the origin of these dilemmas and categorizing them into distinct profiles has been so far lacking. We address this lacuna by utilizing role theory to elucidate the origin of public relations professionals’ ethical dilemmas and employ a deductive approach to extricate such dilemmas from each part of the name “public relations professional.” Each part of the name signifies a distinct role with specific functions and inherent expectations. Put differently, each part implies values expected to be upheld. As such, we portray the “public” role as the midpoint on a continuum, with organization at one end and society at the other; the “relations” role as the midpoint between transactions and bonds; and the “professional” role as the midpoint between employee and citizen. This leads to a multidimensional typology that includes three types of ethical dilemmas: organization-versus-society, transactions-versus-bonds, and employee-versus-citizen. We advance extant scholarship by explaining the origin of public relations professionals’ ethical dilemmas and unifying such dilemmas in an exclusive-inclusive typology.
... We found few studies that use ethical climate theory to inform our understanding of journalism organizations. One of these is Plaisance's (2014) study of 24 moral exemplars in journalism and public relations. In his study, Plaisance uses the Ethical Climate Questionnaire (ECQ) to understand the factors that cultivate good ethical reasoning and behavior. ...
Shortly out of college, the first author began a job as a reporter at a newspaper in the United States (US). A few months in, she became aware of a policy instituted by the managing editor, designed to ensure that the newspaper was consistent in its practice of naming story subjects. Before the policy took effect, one particular group of people had their names withheld, while almost all others had their names published. The managing editor believed what
should be done for one should apply to all – a universal-principles argument that readers will recognize. The managing editor also reasoned that, not only was it legal to name all story subjects, but those affected by what the unnamed sources said had a constitutional right to
confront them. Furthermore, naming those in the heretofore-unnamed group would serve the greater good by helping normalize a stigmatized group of people. Reporters and editors debated the ethics of the policy, but ultimately the managing editor prevailed, and the policy was adopted. Soon after the first author was hired, a story broke that required the policy be put into practice.
The paper ran the name of a rape victim.1
This story illustrates one of the forces at work within an organization that influences journalistic
ethical decisions, which is the subject of this chapter. In this case, the influence was the managing editor, the wielder of power at the “organizational level,” as is it called in the
hierarchy of influences model (Shoemaker & Reese, 2013). This chapter examines the theories and models that address organizations and ethical practices. It reviews evidence of how organizations make ethical decisions and how that influences individual journalists’ ethics.
As the structural systems within which journalists operate evolve, one of the most important questions today is how the absence of an organization affects journalists’ ethics, particularly the ethics of citizen and entrepreneurial journalists and photojournalists.
... Therefore, it is not surprising that the study and utility of exemplars has received considerable attention in academic and popular literature. It has been used in education (Comer & Schwartz, 2017;Engelen, Thomas, Archer, & de Ven., 2018;McNair, 2018), character building (Robinson, 2016;Vos, 2018), ethical theory (Zagzebski, 2013), news and media (Plaisance, 2014), and theology (Bloom, 2012;Tuggy, 2017). ...
Oil-exporting economies (i.e. Libya) are heavily influenced by oil revenues, which are subject to exogenous world price instability. The fluctuations in oil prices, thus its revenue, have serious impact on government budget and future plans. Libyan Customs is an important sector of the state. However, because of security circumstances, Libyan customs faces some difficulties. The main intention of this study is to analyses the challenges facing Libyan customs and its Impact on Libyan economy in general and on the budget in particular. Descriptive research design was adopted. The information was used in this study was collected from literature, books, Central Bank of Libya (CBL) reports and others.
The results showed that the difficulty of customs work in Libya is mainly related to the location of Libya. Its extension and its borders made it vulnerable to a number of different smuggling streams. Libyan budget experienced deficit and it is strongly related to weakness in customs sector. It may be suggested that the government should develop the human resources and training in the customs sector, reform customs law, facilitate customs procedures, and raise the level of fiscal revenue and the effectiveness of combating smuggling and commercial fraud.
Keywords- Libyan economy, customs, borders, budge.
... "Similar to their clustering on personality traits, media exemplars in this study share the same ethical ideology to a striking Christianity, Communication and Journalism Ethics and Morals 8 degree. Their responses to the Forsyth EPQ revealed their uniform rejection of relativistic thinking," (Plaisance, 2014). ...
Christian apologetics has an essential place in the delivery of news. No matter what field of journalism, for either print or broadcast platforms, it is critically important that journalists maintain throughout their professional journey strong ethical and moral principles from the receipt of every assignment to their completed delivery, and after. Engraining Biblical teachings to the mission of each story ensures truthful reporting while demonstrating respect for the community and its values and mores, and ultimately creating a trusting and useful relationship between the journalist and their public.
... Despite the danger that those in positions of power face by having more opportunity to be tempted and being more susceptible to temptation to abuse their power, having legitimate power and status afford Obi the 'luxury of being ethical' that is embedded in a sense of security and moral superiority and (at least initially) drive him to resist social influences to take bribes. However, as a member of the UPU, Obi finds himself in a negative ethical climate (Plaisance 2014;Uhl-Bien and Carsten 2007) in which he is the only one who considers corruption to be wrong. In addition, Obi slowly begins to lose the power he once held due to some of his perceived negative personal attributes and financial pressures which result in him making ethical exceptions (Lammers and Stapel 2009) to live up to his societal expectations. ...
This paper addresses the social context of corruption through literary analysis of Chinua
Achebe’s (1960) novel No Longer at Ease. By exploring the societal influences that may lead an individual to engage in unethical behaviour, the analysis challenges the more predominant view of ethical failure as individual vice and reframes corruption as socially embedded. The analysis unfolds with a brief synopsis of the story, mapping out key plot points of leader-follower relationships and the process of the protagonist becoming corrupt. Secondly, an analysis is presented of the protagonist as a leader and in the role of follower applying knowledge from the field of ethical leadership/followership. Finally, parallels are drawn with the recent, real life case of Kweku Adoboli, a Ghanaian banker convicted of fraud in the UK. Insights from the literary analysis are applied to a to highlight their relevance in the real world and broader understanding of corrupt leadership.
... Uma abordagem virtuosa do jornalismo está preocupada com boas práticas que possam servir de modelo (CHRISTOFOLETTI, 2012), algo semelhante às normas descritivas tratadas anteriormente (LEE; COLEMAN; MOLYNEUX, 2016). Pesquisadores que observam a ética jornalística sob esse prisma (ADAM; CRAFT;COHEN, 2004;BORDEN, 2007;HEINO, 2013;PLAISANCE, 2014;QUINN, 2018) enfatizam antes o caráter dos agentes do que a obediência a regras morais. Substitui-se a pergunta "o que deve ser feito?" para "o que é melhor para a sociedade?" ...
O artigo discute quais são os processos cognitivos e morais implicados nos julgamentos realizados por jornalistas. Considera a contribuição de estudos baseados na psicologia para discutir a formação de esquemas e modelos mentais que auxiliam no processamento de informação por parte dos profissionais. Em seguida, apresenta dados sobre pesquisas de desenvolvimento moral que mensuram graus de raciocínio ético. O texto finaliza aprofundando o conceito de phrônesis, considerado como elemento central nos julgamentos de jornalistas. Entende que a empatia, uma das virtudes vinculadas à doutrina aristotélica, permite complexificar a tomada de decisões perante dilemas morais, pois parte de uma perspectiva intersubjetiva e relacional.
... 355). Stoker's comments link well to Plaisance's (2014) articulation of a different way to see the centrality of ethics for the public relations person. That is, especially during a crisis, rather than attempting to function as a corporate conscience, the exemplary public relations professional ought to exhibit "care and respect for others, professional duty, concern for harm, and proactive social engagement…" (Plaisance, 2014, pp. ...
Over the past 40 years, scholars and practitioners of public relations have often cast public relations workers in the role of the public relations-person-as-corporate-conscience (PRPaCC). This work, however, maintains that this construct is so problematic that invoking it is of negligible use in addressing ethical issues that emerge during a crisis. In fact, a complex crisis, such as the Jahi McMath “brain death” case at Children’s Hospital Oakland (CHO, now UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital Oakland), demonstrates the need to abandon the PRPaCC construct to better engage affected stakeholders, including “outsiders” to the organization, who often determine whether an organization is facing a crisis. Through an examination of both the concept of the PRPaCC and the McMath crisis, this work makes the case for moving beyond the PRPaCC construct in favor of a more modest role for the public relations person: facilitating widespread ethical deliberation and discussion throughout an organization, potentially helping the organization alleviate concerns that contribute to crises.
The primary objective of this study is to show an innovative experience of teaching business ethics that promotes leadership in the Business School of a university in western Mexico. Business ethics students apply a virtue approach to promote their leadership skills. For this, students require general ethics knowledge, as a starting point, to make an in-depth critical analysis of the reality they face in their professional practice. A test of ethical knowledge is applied. The results show that there is a need for minimum knowledge of general ethics to promote leadership in the context of professional ethics undertaken from a virtue approach. In regards to leadership, it can be concluded that ethics is a pivotal factor as the leader’s actions profoundly affect her/his followers and since teaching virtues is primarily conducted by setting examples.
Using Natural Language Processing tools, the current study explores the evolution of objectivity practice in terms of attitude injection. Adopting the indicator of moral loading under the Moral Foundation Theory framework, it examined the moral judgments embedded in 20,679 culture war news articles published in five major U.S. newspapers from 1980 to 2021. Our findings revealed a distinct mixed journalistic liberal pattern and an apparent paradox in objectivity practice: the less moral judgments, the more liberal tendencies, which could be caused by journalists’ watchdog role and the increase of liberal components in U.S. democracy. We then argue that the performance of traditional objectivity has remained robust, especially when accounting for the degree to which moral judgments can be attributed to source quotations. The study contributes to the literature by bridging moral psychology and the enactment of journalistic norms, applying MFT to evaluate degrees of objectivity in news.
Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, has been studied as a hacker, a journalist, and an activist, but scholars have not given sufficient attention to his broader ethical theory. Assange’s cypherpunk ethics emphasises justice while advocating the widespread use of digital cryptography to defend individual privacy and promote institutional transparency. This essay places Assange’s cypherpunk ethics into conversation with contemporary global media ethics through a comparative study with the ethical theory of Clifford Christians. Christians and Assange offer different foundations for metaethics, and these differences give shape to their respective conceptions of cosmopolitanism, their divergent critiques of professional journalism, and advocacy for convivial tools. By bringing a non-academic like Assange into the conversation, this essay practices ethical listening as a part of open media ethics, establishes a descriptive account of Assange’ ethical theory, and introduces a justice-centred ethical paradigm into the field of global media ethics. Available at: www.abramis.co.uk/ethical-space/journal/v19n1/feat1.pdf
Moral exemplars, individuals admired for their moral goodness, are invaluable resources for education and in practice, especially for practices fraught with ethical challenges such as advertising. The current study is the first to examine the moral psychology profile of advertising executives with a range of strategic communication experience as chief executive officers at regional, national, and international agencies and chief marketing officers for national and international brands. The findings indicate that these executives embrace challenges that encourage ideological and character development, believe in values of empathy and compassion, and engage in higher-order moral reasoning more so than advertising practitioners in general but comparable to other media exemplars. They often apply moral rules and standards equally to everyone when considering their response to an ethical dilemma, and their idealistic thinking is positively correlated with perceptions that their organizations have benevolent and principled ethical climates. These findings give strategic communication practitioners, educators, and ethicists a road map of what to look for in individuals likely to serve in the capacity of moral leadership for others.
A growing body of psychology-based scholarship identifies emerging adulthood as a distinct, transitional stage of life and work characterized by several features, wherein relatively little is known regarding moral development. This study is part of a 3-year, longitudinal project involving recent graduates across six U.S. universities who studied journalism and media-related fields. Guided by emerging adulthood, moral psychology, and media exemplar research, this study analyzes results for 110 graduates who completed an online survey regarding their personality traits, virtuous character, moral reasoning, and ethical ideology. It constitutes the first detailed portrait of moral identity of emerging adults in media-related fields.
The foundation of our society depends on proper legislative leadership, making well-deliberated decisions and tough choices on policy on behalf of its citizens. This presentation explores if mindfulness influences legislative policymaking and legislative effectiveness. It considers the role of gender and mindful decision-making. Gender affects judgment through the style, ethics, and values of legislators and, in turn, the policymaking process. The goal of this presentation is to explore the use of mindfulness by state legislators and whether mindful decision-making improves the quality and effectiveness of legislative decision-making. Additionally, we will examine whether there is a difference in gender of mindful legislative decision-making. This presentation is a qualitative study with 31 state legislators of various backgrounds, tenure, and leadership roles within their party. This research found that mindful legislative decision-making has a significant impact on legislative deliberation and policy votes. Furthermore, we discovered that mindful decision-making increases effectiveness and confidence in the legislators' policy decisions and that women use mindful decision-making at a higher rate than men.
This study examined the ethical and professional judgments journalists consider when deciding to trust a whistleblower and determined how whistleblowers influence ethical and newsgathering processes. With a qualitative study, this research uncovered common ethical and procedural considerations journalists, who are influenced by gatekeeping forces, make when presented with information from a whistleblower, with the goal to create a conceptual model—an “ethical algorithm”—that journalists employ when deciding to publish whistleblower disclosures. In addition, the decision to build a trust relationship with a whistleblower is examined from the frameworks of ethical considerations, professional standards, and ethics codes. Finally, the journalist–whistleblower relationship is considered as a form of social exchange, a negotiated relationship in which parties determine trust as a result of an exchange of mutually beneficial acts.
This essay discusses the impact of the situationist challenge to Aristotelian virtue ethics for media ethics instruction. Since virtue ethics is a theory that is centered around character building, it is an unnatural fit for an applied ethics setting. Some pedagogic strategies have been developed by media ethicists to deal with this problem. Referring mainly to John Doris’ situationist criticism of virtue ethics, this essay argues that these strategies as well are problematic, and makes suggestions on how to incorporate situationist insights into the media ethics curriculum.
Le présent rapport fait état des grands enjeux de formation de l’industrie de la communication marketing tels qu’ils sont circonscrits par la recherche scientifique des grandes associations en communication marketing au Canada, États-Unis, Royaume-Uni, France, Belgique.
Commandé par l'Association des agences de communication créative (A2C), ce dépouillement a permis d’identifier quatre tendances lourdes de l’industrie qui changent les pratiques dans l’industrie : 1) les nouvelles opportunités médiatiques, 2) les nouvelles données et mesures, 3) les nouveaux usages chez les consommateurs, 4) les changements dans les effets attendus de la publicité.
Ces tendances et dynamiques de marché appellent des compétences particulières, que tentent d’aborder six enjeux de formation : 1) la réflexivité et l’esprit critique, 2) les modèles de formation, 3) les compétences transversales, 4) la gestion des données, 5) l’intégration des médias sociaux dans les cursus, 6) l’employabilité.
Nous terminons en soulevant quelques pistes de réflexion concernant: 1) la « crise des talents » qui recèle peut-être une occasion de s’interroger sur l’identité même de l’industrie; 2) l’interdisciplinarité comme nouvel ancrage de la créativité; 3) une invitation aux talents à changer l’industrie.
We use the story of the good Samaritan to explore the wide variety of influences that support moral action. From the perspective of Kohlberg’s system, the Samaritan is not acting morally because it is not autonomously morally reasoned – he is instead moved by compassion. This makes his action heteronomous, having multiple influences. We review a wide range of literature on the influences of moral action and conclude that most, if not almost all, moral action is heteronomous. The ubiquity of heteronomy suggests that the story of how moral action is best supported is more complicated than isolated, consciously guided, reflective reasoning. The multiple influences on moral action and their interactions are so diverse, layered, multidimensional, and extended over time, that considering them as a whole should change our evaluation of the role of conscious moral deliberation in moral action. If we want to learn how people do good, and become good, or to evaluate whether they or their actions are good, we will need to embrace this complexity.
The public relations industry is increasingly focusing on evaluation and transparency of its activities. Despite this focus, an “evaluation” component is missing from many ethical decision-making models. Thus, this qualitative study of 22 public relations professionals asked How do public relations professionals evaluate or reflect upon ethical decisions? Five themes signaled that practitioners evaluate ethical decisions by conducting “gut checks,” asking questions, considering society, reflecting on core values, and considering the public's feedback. Findings suggest that professionals evaluate decisions on personal, organizational, and societal levels. Experience in the field, age, and personal intuitions are also factors.
Roger Silverstone (2007) proposed media hospitality as an important element of media ethics. I agree that media hospitality can make a valuable contribution to media ethics. However, I have doubts about grounding media hospitality in what has been referred to as the “deductive abstractions and absolutist language of much media ethics theorizing” founded on Enlightenment assumptions. Despite his own reservations about Enlightenment theorizing, I propose that Silverstone’s account ultimately suffers from these problems of abstraction and absolutism, as seen most clearly from the vantage point of Alasdair MacIntyre’s neo-Aristotelian theory of virtue ethics.
Purpose The purpose of this paper is to present a four component model of ethical behavior that integrates literature in moral psychology, computing ethics, and virtue ethics as informed by research on moral exemplars in computing. This is part 2 of a two part contribution, part 1 having appeared in Vol. 6 No. 3. Design/methodology/approach This psychologically based and philosophically informed model argues that moral action is grounded in relatively stable personality characteristics, guided by integration of morality into the self-system, shaped by the context of the surrounding moral ecology, and facilitated by morally relevant skills and knowledge. Findings The model seeks to explain the daily successful (and unsuccessful) performance of moral action by computing professionals and to provide groundwork for a pedagogy that emphasizes ethically effective performance. Practical implications The model has significant implications for how ethical action to computer professionals and other design professionals might be taught. It also makes recommendations about what need to be measured to construct a complete picture of sustained ethical action in a profession. Originality/value Most accepted models of ethical behavior are unidimensional, emphasizing either principled reasoning or a simplistic model of integrity/character. This model brings together a variety of disparate literatures in the light of its emphasis on sustained moral action in the profession. It thereby provides researchers and educators with a picture of what is needed to construct a complete understanding of moral action in the profession.
This study gathered baseline data on the moral development of 118 public relations professionals. The respondents scored 7th highest among all professionals tested. They performed significantly better when the ethical dilemmas were about public relations issues than when they were not, indicating domain expertise on ethical issues. No significant differences were found between men and women, or managers and nonmanagers. There were significant correlations between moral reasoning and several variables including political ideology and fundamental/liberal religious views.
This article seeks to convince the reader that the empirical literature is often deeply relevant to important debates, and it is therefore intellectually irresponsible to ignore them. Sometimes empirical findings seem to contradict what particular disputing parties assert or presuppose, while in other cases, they appear to reconfigure the philosophical topography, revealing that certain lines of argument must traverse empirically difficult terrain. Often, philosophers who follow these challenging routes will be forced to make additional empirical conjectures, and these conjectures, in their turn, must be subject to empirical scrutiny. The upshot is that an intellectually responsible philosophical ethics is one that continuously engages the relevant empirical literature.
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to present a four component model of ethical behavior (PRIMES) that integrates literature in moral psychology, computing ethics, and virtue ethics as informed by research on moral exemplars in computing. This is part 1 of a two‐part contribution.
Design/methodology/approach
This psychologically based and philosophically informed model argues that moral action is: grounded in relatively stable PeRsonality characteristics (PR); guided by integration of morality into the self‐system; shaped by the context of the surrounding moral ecology; and facilitated by morally relevant skills and knowledge (S).
Findings
The model seeks to explain the daily successful (and unsuccessful) performance of moral action by computing professionals and to provide groundwork for a pedagogy that emphasizes ethically effective performance.
Practical implications
The model has significant implications for how ethical action might be taught to computer professionals and other design professionals. It also makes recommendations about what is needed to measure to construct a complete picture of sustained ethical action in a profession.
Originality/value
Most accepted models of ethical behavior are unidimensional, emphasizing either principled reasoning or a simplistic model of integrity/character. This model brings together a variety of disparate literatures in the light of its emphasis on sustained moral action in the profession. It thereby provides researchers and educators with a picture of what is needed to construct a complete understanding of moral action in the profession.
The Ethical Climate Questionnaire measures the ethical climates at individual and organizational levels of analysis. With 1,167 individuals tested across three surveys the results at the individual level have suggested strong support for the validity and reliability of the questionnaire. However, given the limited number of organizations (n = 12) surveyed, the presence of organizational-level ethical climates remains contestable. This paper reports on the development of the Ethical Climate Questionnaire, includes the results of the latest survey, and contrasts these results with previous findings.
As corporate scandals proliferate, practitioners and researchers alike need a cumulative, quantitative understanding of the antecedents associated with unethical decisions in organizations. In this meta-analysis, the authors draw from over 30 years of research and multiple literatures to examine individual ("bad apple"), moral issue ("bad case"), and organizational environment ("bad barrel") antecedents of unethical choice. Findings provide empirical support for several foundational theories and paint a clearer picture of relationships characterized by mixed results. Structural equation modeling revealed the complexity (multidetermined nature) of unethical choice, as well as a need for research that simultaneously examines different sets of antecedents. Moderator analyses unexpectedly uncovered better prediction of unethical behavior than of intention for several variables. This suggests a need to more strongly consider a new "ethical impulse" perspective in addition to the traditional "ethical calculus" perspective. Results serve as a data-based foundation and guide for future theoretical and empirical development in the domain of behavioral ethics.
Different theories make different predictions about how mean levels of personality traits change in adulthood. The biological view of the Five-factor theory proposes the plaster hypothesis: All personality traits stop changing by age 30. In contrast, contextualist perspectives propose that changes should be more varied and should persist throughout adulthood. This study compared these perspectives in a large (N = 132,515) sample of adults aged 21-60 who completed a Big Five personality measure on the Internet. Conscientiousness and Agreeableness increased throughout early and middle adulthood at varying rates; Neuroticism declined among women but did not change among men. The variety in patterns of change suggests that the Big Five traits are complex phenomena subject to a variety of developmental influences.
People's conceptions of different types of moral exemplarity were examined in an attempt to augment the current emphasis on moral rationality with a fuller understanding of moral personality. In Study 1 (with 805 adults), a free-listing procedure was used to generate the attributes of 3 types of moral exemplars (just, brave, and caring). In Study 2 (with 401 undergraduates), prototypicality- and personality-rating procedures were used to generate a personality profile for each type of moral exemplar and to examine the relations among them. In Study 3 (with 240 undergraduates), a similarity-sorting procedure was used to identify the typologies implicit in people's understanding of these different types of moral exemplarity. The findings indicate that moral excellence can be exemplified in rather divergent ways and that understanding of moral functioning would be enhanced by attention to this wider range of moral virtues.
The purpose of this paper is to investigate public relations practitioners' different perceptions of professional ethics by cohort and personal ethical ideology. The results showed that both age and personal ethical ideology (idealism and relativism) had significant effects on the ethical judgment of professional ethics. Older respondents showed high idealism and low relativism, and a higher level of agreement with professional ethics. Absolutists, who are practitioners with high idealism and low relativism, showed stricter judgment of professional ethics than practitioners with other ethical ideologies. This study found that cohort and individuals' ethical ideology can be important variables in explaining the outcomes of an individual's ethical decision-making.
Journalism ethics theorizing is increasingly preoccupied with identifying and articulating universal norms and standards for media systems across various cultures. This study offers an empirical contribution to this topic by examining the ethical orientations of journalists in 18 countries. Country-level, or ideological, factors, rather than individual-level variables, appear to have the greatest impact on journalists’ degrees of idealism and relativistic thinking. Findings affirm hierarchy-of-influences theories regarding news work. They also raise questions about the nature of universal standards that would constitute a cross-cultural journalism ethics theory and underscore concerns about the viability of Enlightenment assumptions to serve as universal journalism ethical norms.
This study seeks to address the dearth of efforts in mass communications research to assess the efficacy of media ethics curriculum by examining the value systems and ethical ideologies of media ethics students. A pre-post-test survey of 106 students enrolled in a media ethics course in 2001, 2003, and 2004 found significant changes in how students ranked key media-related and journalistic values such as “Fair,” “Independent,” “Aboveboard,” and “Avoiding harm” at the beginning of the course compared with at the end. The study also found significant decreases in students' degrees of idealism and relativism after taking the course, though degrees of both remained high overall.
Sixty exemplary altruists (EA) who have been honored individually in an hour-long national television program for their exemplary altruistic behaviors were individually interviewed for 90 to 120 minutes by trained MA-level interviewers. Their interviews were transcribed verbatim and were content analyzed. With regard to personality characteristics, the EAs showed a high sense of integrity and autonomy. With regard to developmental characteristics, the EAs reported a strong parental attachment, and their parents served as lifelong models for them. It was also observed that many experienced psychological or financial difficulties in their early years. A high sense of moral responsibility and a sense of internalized social responsibility to help those who are experiencing difficulties were primary reinforcers and maintainers of these individuals’ altruistic behavior.
Recent advances in moral psychology and applications of virtue science have created promising opportunities to refine theories of media practice and ethical principles. This article sets forth the theoretical foundation for a model of virtuous action among media exemplars that is multidimensional, inductive, and informed by these developments. The model draws on a range of psycho-social assessment tools to explore five key dimensions of virtuous behavior: story of the self, personality, integration of morality into the self, moral ecology, and moral skills and knowledge. The model's structure is designed to strengthen the empirical basis used to make normative and predictive claims about media practice.
Contemporary moral psychology and education overemphasise rationality and neglect moral virtues and personality that must be part of a comprehensive understanding of moral functioning. The purpose of this study was to delineate the perceived personality characteristics of moral exemplars using the template of the Five-Factor Model which represents the fundamental dimensions of personality, and to compare that trait description with those for related types of exemplars. Participants were 120 adults from across the lifespan (17-91 years) who provided free-listing descriptions of moral, religious and spiritual exemplars, which were then analysed in terms of the five personality factors. Results revealed meaningful differences in personality attributions across types of exemplars, and indicated that traits reflecting the Conscientiousness and Agreeableness factors were particularly salient for the moral exemplar. Discussion focuses on the value of a re-examination of moral character and virtue, and the need to integrate moral cognition and personality within a realistic model of moral functioning and education.
This research study used descriptive phenomenological methods (Giorgi, 1989, Methods, 1, 39-61) to investigate and document the lived experience of altruism as described by moral exemplars. Six moral exemplars wrote descriptions of situations in which they engaged in spontaneous altruism. Altruism was defined for the purpose of this study as a motivational state with the ultimate goal of increasing another's welfare (Batson, 1991, The altruism question: Toward a social psychological answer). These descriptions were then expanded and clarified through follow up interviews. The results of this descriptive phenomenological analysis produced two structures: the structure of the lived experience of altruism as described by moral exemplars, and the structure of the lived experience of helping as described by moral exemplars. The differences between these two structures suggest that altruistically motivated pro-social behavior is more committed, extensive and effective than egoistically motivated helping, and results in a higher level of concern for the long-term well-being of the individuals helped. Although differentiated by primary motivations, altruistic or egoistic, both structures identify the motivating factors of empathy, personal historical life experiences, moral values, and personal identity as essential to the experience of assisting another individual in need.
Presents a questionnaire that executives can use to measure the ethical climate of their companies. The company's ethical climate helps to determine (1) which issues organization members consider to be ethically pertinent and (2) what criteria they use to understand, weigh, and resolve these issues. Suggestions are offered for ways to alter unsatisfactory climates. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
The relation of self-understanding and moral judgment to dedicated prosocial behavior is investigated. Participants were African-American and Latin-American adolescents who had been nominated by community leaders for having demonstrated unusual commitments to care for others or the community (care exemplars). The care exemplars, and matched comparison adolescents, were extensively interviewed over the course of 4–6 sessions in order to elicit self-understanding, moral judgment, and implicit personality theories. The care exemplars were more likely than the comparison adolescents to: (1) describe themselves in terms of moral personality traits and goals, (2) view themselves as having closer continuity to their pasts and futures, (3) think of themselves as incorporating their ideals and parental images, and (4) articulate theories of self in which personal beliefs and philosophies are important. There were no differences between the care exemplars and the comparison adolescents in developmental stages of moral judgment nor in the abstractness of their implicit personality theories.
Two-hundred-fifty-one responses to a battery of 45 professional standard items indicate that public relations professionals randomly surveyed from across the nation tend to underestimate the current state of professional standards in the field. This state of affairs, described in coorientation theory as pluralistic ignorance, suggests that our field may actually hold higher standards and greater confidence in standards than we commonly attribute to our peers. Following the third-person effect, respondents tended to view themselves as better able to withstand pressures and outdated thinking than their peers. In fact, practitioners held their peers in comparatively low esteem, viewing others collectively as somewhat naive, unprofessional and unenlightened in comparison to their own personal self-images. While female practitioners are generally less sanguine about gender and racial equity in public relations, women tend to be more optimistic about standards for ethics and professional functions such as planning and research. Women also tended to be less harsh in their ratings of peer professionalism, while also attributing lower values to others. This study, conducted under the auspices of the Yarbrough Public Relations Laboratory, is a followup to preliminary results of the survey of practitioners reported in the article titled "Developing Standards of Professional Performance in Public Relations" published in Public Relations Review in 1996. Preliminary results of a followup survey of educators was reported in the article "Professional Standards in Public Relations: A Survey of Educators" published in Public Relations Review in 1997.
The relation of self-understanding and moral judgment to dedicated prosocial behavior is investigated. Participants were African-American and Latin-American adolescents who had been nominated by community leaders for having demonstrated unusual commitments to care for others or the community (care exemplars). The care exemplars, and matched comparison adolescents, were extensively interviewed over the course of 4-6 sessions in order to elicit self-understanding, moral judgment, and implicit personality theories. The care exemplars were more likely than the comparison adolescents to: (1) describe themselves in terms of moral personality traits and goals, (2) view themselves as having closer continuity to their pasts and futures, (3) think of themselves as incorporating their ideals and parental images, and (4) articulate theories of self in which personal beliefs and philosophies are important. There were no differences between the care exemplars and the comparison adolescents in developmental stages of moral judgment nor in the abstractness of their implicit personality theories.