Dilemmas, Conspiracies, and Sophie's Choice: Vignette Themes and Ethical Judgments

Knowledge about ethical judgments has not advanced appreciably after decades of research. Such research, however, has rarely addressed the possible importance of the content of such judgments; that is, the material appearing in the brief vignettes or scenarios on which survey respondents base their...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inJournal of business ethics Vol. 118; no. 3; pp. 639 - 653
Main Authors Mudrack, Peter E., Mason, E. Sharon
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Dordrecht Springer 01.12.2013
Springer Netherlands
Springer Nature B.V
Subjects
Accountancy
Accounting ethics
Bribery
Business and Management
Business Ethics
Business structures
Conspiracy
Decision analysis
Decision making
Education
Ethical behavior
Ethics
Judgement
Judgment
Management
Moral judgment
Philosophy
Polls & surveys
Protagonists
Quality of Life Research
Social ethics
Studies
Victims
Whistles
Literature review
Ethical judgments
Vignette themes
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Summary:Knowledge about ethical judgments has not advanced appreciably after decades of research. Such research, however, has rarely addressed the possible importance of the content of such judgments; that is, the material appearing in the brief vignettes or scenarios on which survey respondents base their evaluations. Indeed, this content has seemed an afterthought in most investigations. This paper closely examined the vast array of vignettes that have appeared in relevant research in an effort to reduce this proliferation to a more concise set of overarching vignette themes. Six generic themes emerged from this process, labeled here as Dilemma, Classic, Conspiracy, Sophie's Choice, Runaway Trolley, and Whistle Blowing. Each of these themes is characterized by a unique combination of four key factors that include the extent of protagonist personal benefit from relevant vignette activities and victim salience in vignette descriptions. Theme identification enabled inherent ambiguities in vignettes that threaten construct validity to come into sharp focus, provided clues regarding appropriate vignette construction, and may help to make sense of patterns of empirical findings that heretofore have seemed difficult to explain.
Bibliography:ObjectType-Article-2
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ISSN:0167-4544
1573-0697
DOI:10.1007/s10551-012-1611-0