Ethical Judgement

This study examines whether perceived ethical climate of the firm, exposure to ethics and moral reasoning have an influence on the ethical judgement of auditors in Malaysia. Analysis suggests that all three factors have positive and significant influence on the ethical judgement of auditors. This study also finds that the moral reasoning of majority of the auditors in Malaysia is contained within the first and second levels of Kohlberg's moral development stage although some have also achieved the highest level. It is deduced that this is because majority of the auditors in Malaysia are more deontologists in approach rather than teleologists and that they tend to adhere to strict rules and processes. Additionally, the study finds that the level of ethical judgement among these auditors is at the average level. The findings will be useful for the government, the regulator and also audit firms which are striving to improve the ethicality of their auditors.

This study investigates the relationship between ethical ideologies, Machia-vellianism, perceived ethical problem, gender and ethical intention. The results from a survey of students in marketing classes from an Australian university branch campus in Malaysia revealed that relativism and Machiavellianism have negative impact on ethical intention of students. However, idealism and perceived ethical problems have positive impacts on their ethical intention. Moreover, the study found that gender is not a determinant of the ethical intentions of students. This study is attempting to improve our understanding of the ethical issues existing in one of the emergent markets (i.e. Malaysia). Additionally, it offers some implications for marketing educators.

Ethical decision-making is an important element in engineering profession. The objective of this study is to
examine final year engineering students’ ethical decision-making ability and cognitive reasoning skills. The
research questions aim to investigate the considerations and general steps that students go through in a
decision-making process. This study gathered qualitative data through written decisions and interviews.
Twelve engineering students in a Malaysian private engineering school were asked to read two ethical
vignettes and write down their decisions. This was followed by semi-structured interview questions, in
alignment with the steps in an ethical decision-making model, to gauge the students’ reasoning behind their
decisions. The interview transcripts were analyzed and common themes that influence the ethical decision-making of students were identified. The analysis focused on ethical sensitivity and ethical judgement of
students. Students demonstrated a decent level of ethical sensitivity emphasizing professional responsibility
but their ethical judgment varied according to case study. In general, students were able to identify underlying
issue and affected parties, but did not give much thought to potential course of action. This study draws
reflection on engineering students’ flow of thinking and cognitive reasoning processes when given a situation
to deal with. The findings of this study stress the importance of engineering schools integrating relevant case
studies or true accounts of engineering practices to develop ethical decision-making ability and cognitive
reasoning among future engineers. This would prepare the engineering students to face the ethical challenges
in their profession.

Today, technological implants to increase innate human capabilities are already available on the market. Cyborgs, understood as healthy people who decide to integrate their bodies with insideable technology, are no longer science fiction, but fact. The cyborg market will be a huge new business with important consequences for both industry and society. More specifically, cyborg technologies are a unique product, with a potentially critical impact on the future of humanity. In light of the potential transformations involved in the creation of “superhuman” cyborgs, ethics must be a cornerstone of cyborg marketing decisions. Businesses need to take ethics into account, not only to ensure they behave ethically, as always, but also because ethics will be an important factor in buyers’ decisions in the emerging cyborg market. This is because the decision to become a cyborg is determined, among many other factors, by ethical judgment. Our research focuses on how the dimensions of the Composite Multidimensional Ethics Scale (Composite MES) influence an individual’s decision to become a cyborg. To test our hypotheses, we surveyed a total of 1563 higher-education students in seven different countries. The results of the survey show that ethical judgment will be a keystone in individual cyborgization. Specifically, ethical dimensions explained 48% of the intention to use cyborg technologies. The ethical analysis showed that not all MES dimensions have the same influence on the ethical judgment regarding this decision. Egoism was the most influential dimension, while contractualism was the least. These findings have important implications for both academia and business.

This research aims to examine the ethical judgements of history teacher candidates regarding certain variables. The method of investigation is a case study. The study group of the study consisted of 28 history teacher candidates. The data were collected by qualitative questionnaire. In the analysis of the data, content and descriptive analyses were used. Frequency (f), percentage (%) and cross tabulation were used in the analysis of quantitative data. As a result of the research, it was detected that the majority of the history teacher candidates could recognise the ethical judgement and show the ethical judgement tendency. The tendencies of the ethical judgement of history teacher candidates have been based on causality and the great men. Half of the History teacher candidates showed a tendency towards the counterfactual ethical judgements. However, it has been understood that in the examples given by teacher candidates, they confounded the counterfactual causality and counterfactual ethical judgements. The epistemological beliefs of the majority of history teacher candidates regarding ethical judgements use are that ethical judgments should not be used. However, some of the history teacher candidates with epistemological beliefs that ethical judgements should not be used showed a tendency of the ethical judgements by showing inconsistency. Also, it is understood in the research that an essential condition of avoiding the ethical judgements is the ability to recognize the ethical judgements in historical texts. (Bu araştırmanın amacı tarih öğretmen adaylarının ahlaki yargılarını bazı değişkenler açısından incelemektir. Araştırmanın yöntemi durum çalışmasıdır. Araştırmanın çalışma grubu 28 tarih öğretmen adayından oluşmaktadır. Araştırmada veriler, nitel anket ile toplanmıştır. Verilerin analizinde ise içerik ve betimsel analiz kullanılmıştır. Nicel verilerin analizinde frekans (f), yüzde (%) ve çapraz tablolar kullanılmıştır. Araştırma sonucunda tarih öğretmen adaylarının çoğunluğun ahlaki yargıları fark edebildiği ve ahlaki yargı eğilimi gösterdiği bulgulanmıştır. Tarih öğretmen adaylarının ahlaki yargı eğilimleri nedensellik, büyük adamlar üzerinden gerçekleşmiştir. Öğretmen adaylarının yarısı karşıolgusal ahlaki yargı eğilimi göstermiştir. Ancak öğretmen adaylarının verdikleri örneklerde karşıolgusal nedensellik ile karşıolgusal ahlaki yargıları karıştırdıkları anlaşılmıştır. Tarih öğretmen adaylarının çoğunluğunun ahlaki yargı kullanımına ilişkin epistemolojik inançları ahlaki yargıların kullanılmaması yönündedir. Ancak ahlaki yargı kullanılmamalı yönünde epistemolojik inançlara sahip tarih öğretmen adaylarının azımsanamayacak bir kısmı tutarsızlık göstererek ahlaki yargı eğilimi göstermiştir. Ayrıca araştırmada ahlaki yargılardan kaçınabilmenin önemli bir koşulunun tarihsel metinlerdeki ahlaki yargıları fark edebilme becerisi olduğu anlaşılmıştır.)