Medicine and Health Sciences Commons^™

Effects Of Moral Sensitivity And Moral Climate On Moral Reasoning, Marita Louise Mahoney

Loma Linda University Electronic Theses, Dissertations & Projects

As healthcare professionals, psychology students and psychologists are expected to behave ethically and morally. It is assumed that moral and ethical reasoning in psychology students develops through exposure to ethical dilemmas within ethics classes and during clinical training experiences. Rest's Four Component Model of Moral Behavior, a neo-Kohlbergian approach to understanding moral development, posits an interaction of Moral Sensitivity, Moral Motivation, Moral Reasoning and Moral Character. Moral sensitivity, or awareness of a moral dilemma, is posited to cue the moral reasoning process, though little is known about how the training environment can facilitate or hamper such developments. Fifty".'two psychology-graduate students …