Search PubMed⌕ Search

SEARCH · Search PubMed

Results for “MORALS”

Search indexed PubMed citations on genomics, clinical trials, systematic reviews and public health. Explore titles, authors and supplied subject terms, then open the PubMed record.

Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.

At least 379 records · Page 21Linked to original sources
PubMed1985

A state hospital's humanistic approach to low employee morale.

This presentation addresses the problem of low morale of employees in psychiatric delivery services. The article describes an action research project that investigates the low morale of employees at the Osawatomie State Hospital, a state facility for psychiatric disabled citizens in eastern Kansas. Action research goes beyond the cognition causes identified by behavioral methods of many organizational investigations of morale. In this study, data was collected from individual in-depth interviews with a random sample of hospital employees. The employees were encouraged to discuss their reactions toward the negative morale factors that had been identified from an earlier employee morale survey. The outcome of this action research project resulted in organizational changes that provided hospital administrators with a proactive, rather than a reactive approach to employees' concerns.

Decision Making, Organizational↗
PubMed1986

Moral reasoning, parental sex attitudes, and sex guilt in female college students.

Forty-eight female college students completed the Mosher Forced-Choice Guilt Inventory, the Rest Defining Issues Test, and the Family Attitude and Communication Scale in order to study the relationship between sex guilt, moral reasoning, and perceived parental sex attitudes. Analysis of variance indicated that Stage 4 moral reasoners had significantly higher sex guilt scores than Stage 5 reasoners. There was also a significant interaction effect between moral reasoning and perceived parental sex attitudes with respect to sex guilt, with Stage 5 reasoners from permissive family backgrounds having very low levels of guilt. The findings suggested that there is an overall negative relationship between sex guilt and moral reasoning, supporting prior studies. However, the relationship between sex guilt and permissive/restrictive family background is more complicated. Paradoxically, more advanced Stage 5 reasoners seemed more influenced by family sexual attitudes than Stage 4 reasoners. The authors offer an explanation for this finding and stress the importance of moral reasoning as a variable in understanding sexual attitudes and behavior.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2006

Is health inequality across individuals of moral concern?

The history of the documentation of health inequality is long. The way in which health inequality has customarily been documented is by comparing differences in the average health across groups, for example, by sex or gender, income, education, occupation, or geographic region. In the controversial World Health Report 2000, researchers at the World Health Organization criticized this traditional practice and proposed to measure health inequality across individuals irrespective of individuals' group affiliation. They defended its proposal on the moral grounds without clear explanation. In this paper I ask: is health inequality across individuals of moral concern, and, if so, why? Clarification of these questions is crucial for meaningful interpretation of health inequality measured across individuals. Only if there was something morally problematic in health inequality across individuals, its reduction would be good news. Specifically, in this paper I provide three arguments for the moral significance of health inequality across individuals: (a) health is special, (b) health equity plays an important and unique role in the general pursuit of justice, and (c) health inequality is an indicator of general injustice in society. I then discuss three key questions to examine the validity of these arguments: (i) how special is health?, (ii) how good is health as an indicator?, and (iii) what do we mean by injustice? I conclude that health inequality across individuals is of moral interest with the arguments (b) and (c).

Global Health↗
PubMed2006

Moral creativity in science and engineering.

Creativity in science and engineering has moral significance and deserves attention within professional ethics, in at least three areas. First, much scientific and technological creativity constitutes moral creativity because it generates moral benefits, is motivated by moral concern, and manifests virtues such as beneficence, courage, and perseverance. Second, creativity contributes to the meaning that scientists and engineers derive from their work, thereby connecting with virtues such as authenticity and also faults arising from Faustian trade-offs. Third, morally creative leadership is important at all levels of science and engineering.

Creativity↗
PubMed1991

Attribution of causal and moral responsibility to victims of father-daughter incest: an exploratory examination of five factors.

This study was designed to assess the extent to which victim characteristics, assault characteristics, and respondents' sex would affect attributions of causal and moral responsibility to an incest victim. The victim was either a 7- or 15-year-old child who responded in either a passive or resisting manner. The incestuous abuse involved either sexual intercourse or fondling, and either high or low levels of coercion. The subjects were undergraduate students (male = 240; female = 240) who responded to a vignette describing a sexual interaction between a father and daughter. The results indicate that significantly more causal and moral responsibility was attributed to the victim in cases where the victim responded passively. A breakdown of the significant form of responsibility x victim age x coerciveness interaction revealed a significant main effect for form of responsibility; significantly more causal (as opposed to moral) responsibility was attributed to the victim. The simple main effects for victim age were significant in all cases except for the moral responsibility, high coercion condition; and the simple main effects for coercion were significant in all cases except for the moral responsibility, 7-year-old victim condition. These findings are discussed in terms of their implications for public education and future research.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2004

Influence of bodily harm on neural correlates of semantic and moral decision-making.

Moral decision-making is central to everyday social life because the evaluation of the actions of another agent or our own actions made with respect to the norms and values guides our behavior in a community. There is previous evidence that the presence of bodily harm--even if irrelevant for a decision--may affect the decision-making process. While recent neuroimaging studies found a common neural substrate of moral decision-making, the role of bodily harm has not been systematically studied so far. Here we used event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to investigate how behavioral and neural correlates of semantic and moral decision-making processes are modulated by the presence of direct bodily harm or violence in the stimuli. Twelve participants made moral and semantic decisions about sentences describing actions of agents that either contained bodily harm or not and that could easily be judged as being good or bad or correct/incorrect, respectively. During moral and semantic decision-making, the presence of bodily harm resulted in faster response times (RT) and weaker activity in the temporal poles relative to trials devoid of bodily harm/violence, indicating a processing advantage and reduced processing depth for violence-related linguistic stimuli. Notably, there was no increase in activity in the amygdala and the posterior cingulate cortex (PCC) in response to trials containing bodily harm. These findings might be a correlate of limited generation of the semantic and emotional context in the anterior temporal poles during the evaluation of actions of another agent related to violence that is made with respect to the norms and values guiding our behavior in a community.

Adult↗
PubMed2005

The moral nature of patient-centeredness: is it "just the right thing to do"?

OBJECTIVE: Patient-centeredness is regarded as an important feature of high quality patient care, but little effort has been devoted to grounding patient-centeredness as an explicitly moral concept. We sought to describe the moral commitments that underlie patient-centered care. METHODS: We analyzed the key ideas that are commonly described in the literature on patient-centeredness in the context of three major schools of ethical thought. RESULTS: Consequentialist moral theories focus on the positive outcomes of providing patient-centered care. Deontological theories emphasize how patient-centered care reflects the ethical norms inherent in medicine, such as respect for persons and shared decision-making. Virtue-based theories highlight the importance of developing patient-centered attitudes and traits, which in turn influence physicians' behaviors toward their patients. CONCLUSION: Different ethical theories concentrate on different features of patient-centered care, but all can agree that patient-centeredness is morally valuable. PRACTICE IMPLICATIONS: In order to sustain patient-centeredness as a moral concept, practitioners and students ought to examine these ideas to determine what their own personal reasons are for or against adopting a patient-centered approach.

Attitude of Health Personnel↗
PubMed2003

Strategies of control, aggression, and morality in preschoolers: an evolutionary perspective.

Moral reasoning, moral affect, social problem solving skills, and social preferences were assessed in 163 ethnically mixed preschoolers (2.86-5.95 years). Participants were rated by their teachers on prosocial and coercive strategies of control, success at resource control, and aggression (overt and relational). Based on their employment of coercive and prosocial strategies of resource control, the children were categorized as bistrategic controllers, coercive controllers, prosocial controllers, noncontrollers, or typicals. Teacher-rated relational aggression was positively associated with moral maturity in girls. Bistrategic controllers, although aggressive, were morally mature and preferred play partners by their peers. The results are discussed in terms of hypotheses that arise from evolutionary theory which suggests that highly effective resource controllers would be simultaneously aggressive and yet well aware of moral norms. The findings are contrasted with alternative hypotheses that might arise variously from traditional and prevailing approaches.

Affect↗
PubMed2003

Bioethics and religions: religious traditions and understandings of morality, health, and illness.

For many individuals, religious traditions provide important resources for moral deliberation. While contemporary philosophical approaches in bioethics draw upon secular presumptions, religion continues to play an important role in both personal moral reasoning and public debate. In this analysis, I consider the connections between religious traditions and understandings of morality, medicine, illness, suffering, and the body. The discussion is not intended to provide a theological analysis within the intellectual constraints of a particular religious tradition. Rather, I offer an interpretive analysis of how religious norms often play a role in shaping understandings of morality. While many late 19th and early 20th century social scientists predicted the demise of religion, religious traditions continue to play important roles in the lives of many individuals. Whether bioethicists are sympathetic or skeptical toward the normative claims of particular religious traditions, it is important that bioethicists have an understanding of how religious models of morality, illness, and healing influence deliberations within the health care arena.

Attitude to Health↗
PubMed1976

Role-taking standpoint and adolescent usage of Kohlberg's conventional stages of moral reasoning.

By taking into account a respondent's role-taking standpoint, this study proposes that moral judgments coded at Kohlberg's conventional stages can be expected to vary depending upon (a) the identity of the protagonist implicated in the moral dilemma and (b) the nature of the issues raised by the moral dilemmas used. Different groups of respondents were asked to answer three versions of Kohlberg's moral judgment questionnaire. One version implicated strangers in the dilemmas used (fictitious-other questionnaire), while the other two versions implicated respondents' best friends or mothers (primary-other questionnaires). A comparison of these questionnaire treatments indicates that Stage 3 response rate significantly increases and Stage 4 response rate significantly decreases when respondents answer primary-other questionnaires. It is suggested that this finding casts doubt on the adequacy of the displacement view of moral stage acquisition. The displacement perspective argues that as more cognitively complex structures are acquired, earlier acquired structures are displaced. In contrast, the present study proposes that a "nondisplacement" view of stage acquisition is required in order to explain variation observed at Stage 3 when it may be assumed that a Stage 4 reasoning capability has been acquired.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1997

In a very different voice: unmasking moral hypocrisy.

Across 3 small studies, 80 female undergraduates were confronted with the dilemma of deciding whom-themselves or another research participant-to assign to a positive consequences task, leaving the other to do a dull, boring task. In Study 1, where morality was not mentioned, 16 of 20 assigned themselves to the positive consequences task, even though in retrospect only 1 said this was moral. In Studies 2 and 3, a moral strategy was suggested: either flipping a coin or accepting task assignment by the experimenter. In Study 2, 10 of 20 participants flipped a coin, but of these, 9 assigned themselves the positive consequences task. In Study 3, participants were significantly more likely to accept the experimenter's assignment when it gave them the positive consequences task. Overall, results suggested motivation to appear moral yet still benefit oneself. Such motivation is called moral hypocrisy.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1987

Achievement motivation, achieving styles, and morale in the elderly.

This research extends the literature on variables predictive of morale from the often-researched demographic, physical, and social factors to the psychological variables of achievement motivation and achieving styles. A sample of 115 older adults completed the Work and Family Orientation Questionnaire, the L-BLA Achieving Styles Inventory, and the PGC (Philadelphia Geriatric Center) Morale Scale. Regression analysis indicated that five variables were predictive of morale: (a) direct achieving style, (b) instrumental achieving style, (c) health, (d) social participation, and (e) age. The instrumental achieving style and age were inversely related to morale, although the direct and instrumental achieving styles were the two best predictors of morale.

Achievement↗
PubMed2005

Toward a more pragmatic approach to morality: a critical evaluation of Kohlberg's model.

In this article, the authors evaluate L. Kohlberg's (1984) cognitive- developmental approach to morality, find it wanting, and introduce a more pragmatic approach. They review research designed to evaluate Kohlberg's model, describe how they revised the model to accommodate discrepant findings, and explain why they concluded that it is poorly equipped to account for the ways in which people make moral decisions in their everyday lives. The authors outline in 11 propositions a framework for a new approach that is more attentive to the purposes that people use morality to achieve. People make moral judgments and engage in moral behaviors to induce themselves and others to uphold systems of cooperative exchange that help them achieve their goals and advance their interests.

Activities of Daily Living↗
PubMed1975

Moral judgment in sociopathic and normal children.

Mental age- and IQ-matched normal and sociopathic children were administered Kohlberg's moral development interview and the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children. The results revealed that level of moral reasoning was higher for normal than for sociopathic children at both mental age levels. Within each group, high-mental-age children tended to have higher moral judgment scores than low-mental-age children, suggesting the presence of a general cognitive factor underlying moral development. The poorer performance of the sociopathic children was interpreted as supporting the formulation that sociopathy is related to an arrest in moral development. Discussion focused on the relative lack of opportunities for role-taking and identification in the families of sociopathic children.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2000

Nursing, empathy and perception of the moral.

Over the last 15-20 years we have witnessed a dramatic interest in the moral domain of clinical practice. There has also been a growing focus on the patient as an individual whose individuality and perspective must be respected. It is argued in this paper that a key to both these concerns is a consideration of the role of empathy in both perceiving the moral aspects and issues of practice, and in providing adequate support for patients. In this paper the meaning and components of empathy are discussed in the context of human receptivity and preconditions of moral performance. However, we also draw attention to empirical studies which suggest that even following adequate educational preparation, if the clinical environment and the structures within which care is delivered are not supportive, the practitioner's ability to perceive the moral is limited. In such circumstances, patients are in danger of receiving less than appropriate care - from both the moral and professional perspective.

Empathy↗
PubMed2003

Medical education, palliative care and moral attitude: some objectives and future perspectives.

CONTEXT: Adequate medical education has 3 interrelated aspects: theoretical knowledge, practical skills and the personal attitude of the doctor. The current emphasis on medical science diverts attention from the importance of the attitude aspect of medical education. We argue that the integration of palliative care into medical curricula can correct this imbalance between knowledge, skills and attitude. In our view, incorporating palliative care into medical training not only improves the quality of palliative care, but also contributes to the moral quality of the doctors being trained. To support our argument we emphasise the moral aspects of attitude. Moral attitude focuses on the capacity to respond to others in a humane manner and can be compared with the way a virtuous doctor acts. We show the crucial role this moral attitude plays in palliative care and the surplus value palliative care education can have in general medical training. PERSPECTIVES: We suggest that clinical experience in palliative care, supplemented by reflection on narratives about chronically ill or dying patients and mourning or ageing processes, offers prospects for developing palliative care education. These perspectives can contribute to the transformation of the present 'hidden curriculum' of contemporary medical education, which implicitly shapes the student's moral attitude, into a future more explicit enculturation into the medical realm. Ultimately, this will improve health care as a whole.

Attitude of Health Personnel↗
PubMed2003

Unable to answer the call of our patients: mental health nurses' experience of moral distress.

When health practitioners' moral choices and actions are thwarted by constraints, they may respond with feelings of moral distress. In a Canadian hermeneutic phenomenological study, physicians, nurses, psychologists and non-professional aides were asked to identify care situations that they found morally distressing, and to elaborate on how moral concerns regarding the care of patients were raised and resolved. In this paper, we describe the experience of moral distress related by nurses working in mental healthcare settings who believed that lack of resources (such as time and staff) leads to dispiritedness, lack of respect, and absence of recognition (for both patients and staff) which severely diminished their ability to provide quality care. The metaphors of flashlight and hammer are used to elaborate nurses' possible responses to intolerable situations.

Adaptation, Psychological↗
PubMed2006

Nursing morale: what does the literature reveal?

There is increasing attention to nursing workforce issues such as recruitment, retention, turnover, workplace health and safety issues and their impact on quality patient care. A number of these problems have been linked to poor morale. While there has been a lack of consensus on the determinants of morale, it is clear that the outcomes of poor morale not only add considerable cost to the organisation but also impact negatively on patient care. This article provides a systematic overview of the literature surrounding nursing morale and the variables identified in the literature that impact upon morale, and discusses the implications for future research.

Humans↗