Affect In Ethical Decision Making: Mood Matters

As we practice resolving dilemmas we find ethics to be less a goal than a pathway, less a destination than a trip, less an inoculation than a process. —Ethicist Rushworth Kidder

This demonstrates the role emotions play in for deciding our choices. But what happens if there is not a right choice.

In this paper, I will explicate how a Utilitarian and a Kantian would understand the Trolley Problem and describe why I consider the Utilitarian approach to fare better in the case of the Trolley Problem. On one hand, a Utilitarian, a believer in the philosophy of Utilitarianism, believes that a morally admirable action is one that helps the maximum number of people. A Kantian, on the other hand, is a believer and follower of the Kantian ethics, which fundamentally preach that the correctness or wrongness of one’s actions depends on if one carries out one’s duty, and not on the consequences of one’s actions. In order to further understand the perspectives of these two philosophies, I will explain how they would comprehend the Trolley Problem, which is, essentially, a theoretical moral predicament where a trolley is speeding down a railway track and five people are tied to the track and a bystander has two options: either pull a lever, divert the train to an alternate railway track with one person on it and kill that one person and save five people, and thus intentionally commit homicide, or the bystander doesn’t pull the lever and lets five people die, therefore submissively allowing five deaths.

Every day we are faced with certain situations that challenge us with how to act in an ethical manner. It can be human nature to feel unsure or conflicted with the correct moral choice. Some can say that one should know how to handle such dilemmas and others may say that there should be a reference of some sort to help guide through such conflicts. Sometimes we know the answers and sometimes we are unsure of how to handle certain situations. Most times we go through life wondering what we should do. As I become further educated on the different theories of ethics, I believe there are answers that are available in guiding one through an ethical dilemma and or judgment. I will discuss Vincent Ruggiero’s three basic criteria, Robert Kegan’s order of consciousness, the three schools of ethics and the correlation between all three.

Judith Jarvis Thomson presents an ethical dilemma entitled The Trolley Problem in The Monist. The problem describes a situation in which a trolley car is moving quickly and out of control on a train track towards five people who are tied to the tracks; you have the power to pull a lever, change the direction of the trolley car and save those five people – at the expense of the life of one person who is on the track the car was diverted to (Thomson 1397). The choice to be made is not just about whether or not one should pull the lever though. The problem dictates a choice about whether one would kill, in the case of choosing to pull the lever to kill the one person and save the five, or letting die, in which case nothing is done and the five are killed because of the lack of action taken (Thomson 1398). Thomson believes it would be incorrect to turn the trolley and willingly choose to kill one person, rather than allow the five to die, but the philosophies of Immanuel Kant and John Stewart Mill must be analyzed to determine whether they would agree with Thomson, or have a different view from Thomson as well as one another. When considering J.J. Thomson’s Trolley Problem, the philosophies of Kant and Mill must be fully analyzed and expressed to determine the most plausible perspective to be taken by both philosophers on the issue. There are strengths, weaknesses and criticisms of both ethical arguments, and these will be considered as well in the analysis.

Throughout the last century, The Unites States of America has been affectionately dubbed, “the melting pot.” Although our Western culture was built on a multicultural foundation, we have nevertheless failed, “to embrace many of the needs, views, and perspectives specific to those not considered part” of the dominant White-Western culture. Only in recent decades have we truly started to address this gap and the needs associated with serving others from a culturally sensitive standpoint. The American Counseling Association (ACA) has slowly adapted to these needs by integrating culturally sensitive language in the ACA Code of Ethics; however, culture permeates every aspect and every level of the counseling process and does not stand alone.

Both philosophical approaches are infused with flaws, the use of “utilitarian” thinking is not always clear of what form of action should be taken or if the action you took will have a favorable outcome for the majority. It is difficult to judge what decision will supply the best way to respond to a situation. The universal approach unlike the utilitarian bases its decisions on the facts that the action taken is best for everyone regardless of the situation or the difference in people. My choice between the two is somewhat tossed, because my belief is that you should do unto other as you would want done to you, but at the same time my desire to ensure the greatest number of success is important to me as well. Within the Judicial system decisions are made with or without the input of others; however it is our moral obligation to ensure that we

The trolley issue features a central pressure between two schools of good idea. The utilitarian point of view manages that most fitting activity is the one that accomplishes the best useful for the best number. In the meantime, the deontological point of view affirms that specific activities – like killing a blameless individual – are quite recently wrong, regardless of the possibility that they have great outcomes. In the two forms of the trolley issue over, utilitarian's say you should give up one to spare five, while deontologists say you ought not.

I believe the initial considerations are related to Bill making a good faith effort to protect his client (the child) and provide confidentiality using a sound ethical decision-making model, his ethical identity, the code, and the agreed upon “informed consent”. He is now on the witness stand in a courtroom testifying. His role should be that he is a clinical mental health counselor in private practice and his client is the child. However, I believe Bill has made some mistakes along the way with his decision-making, the use of the code, and now his ethical identity is challenged in what could be a high pressure courtroom setting. It does seem that he is not actually sure what his role is at the moment.

Whether or not we realize it at the time, all our words, actions and attitudes reflect choices. A foundation to good decision-making is acceptance of two core principles: 1. we all have the power to decide what we do and what we say, and 2. we are morally responsible for the consequences of our choices. Sometimes the power to choose is not self-evident. Outside control and inner emotions can leave one feeling powerless. Especially when one is young or immature, feelings of joy and depression, anger, fear, frustration, grief, anxiety, resentment, jealousy, guilt, loneliness, love and lust seem to come and go on their own, creating moods that may seem beyond control. The intensity of our feelings can encourage us to act and react impulsively

This is easier said than done, due to the fact that our emotions can be spontaneous and almost uncontrollable. Awareness of how our different moods and emotions play into our judgments is the only way to overcome poor decision-making when confronted with these types of scenarios. It is easy in times of joy or sadness to make harsh decisions that we will often regret in the long

I have recognized how emotions are playing a major role in our decision-making process. Noticing how Naz was influenced by his emotions helped me acknowledging how our emotions can delay or prevent us from making the best decision. Despite the fact that the outcome for Naz turns out to be beneficial, his emotions delayed him from reaching that outcome. Also, seeing how Naz intuition was accurate, even though it took him time to express it, helped me distinguishing the role of accurate intuition in the process of

As a bystander, you cannot warn the people. Instead, there is a lever allowing you divert the trolley to another track, but there is one person the track who would be killed instead. The majority of participant chose to pull the lever, valuing five lives higher than one. This fairly hands-off scenario leads to utilitarian, rational reasoning, with the goal being to minimize life lost. In a second trial, the participants were told they were standing on a bridge over the track with a fat man. In this case, the only way to save the people involved pushing the man off the bridge, killing him, but stopping the trolley due to the man’s large mass. People’s answers changed in this scenario. Using brain scans, Greene found that the hands-on nature of pushing a person in front of the trolley caused the parts of the brain linked to emotions yo activate. Further research found that emotion takes control over in more personal situations, causing a more deontological

Management constitute amongst major components of a company, organization or a business. As such, management oversees employees interactions with their supervisors and also control of people within a particular organization. Also, it includes critical and ethical decision-making process so as to address various ethical dilemmas experienced by employees while undertaking their respective assigned duties within the company. Ethical dilemmas are hereby to stay as issues usually arise now and then and place a variety of options that bear different repercussions. Therefore, it calls for ethical and critical decision-making skills so as to make the most appropriate option that bears more benefits in comparison to other options presented. While making ethical decisions, it 's substantially important to play heed to a certain ethical decision-making theory. This would enable an individual making the decision to ripe best possible consequences rather than living to regret. Moreover, ethical decision making is typically important in business as making a wrong decision may result not only in huge losses but also poor relationship amongst colleagues and miserable life for employee(s) working in a particular company or business in question.

Nurses often encountered various ethical dilemmas in the practice setting. Both virtue ethics and caring ethics support good ethical decision making for nurses (Park, 2012, p. 149) but these are inadequate to assist in solving an ethical dilemma (Park, 2012, p. 149). For that reason an ethical decision making tool is helpful for the nurses or clinicians to come up with an ethical decision (Kelly, 2012, p. 571) that allows them to gather information, identify any gap of understanding on the issue or the disagreements between the involved parties through a clear communication (Park, 2012, p. 140). Several authors presented an ethical decision making processes (Park, 2012, p. 141), here presented the two processes that can be applied in resolving an ethical dilemma. One example of ethical decision making process is the DECIDE model by Thompson, Melia & Boyd (Allen, Chapman, Francis, & O’Connor, 2008, p. 5) and the Integrated ethical decision-making model which was derived from the combination of the different ethical decision-making models strengths (Park, 2012, p. 140). These two ethical decision-making model steps are identical to each but differ on the detailed instruction on how the steps are to be done or used in actual case. By comparing the two models the integrated ethical decision-making model have a detailed instruction. The