Ethical Decision Making in the Public Accounting Profession: An Extension of Ajzen’s Theory of Planned Behavior

Health leaders in Canada face a myriad of challenges with healthcare philanthropy—not just the practical question of how to be successful but also ethical questions. Is fundraising in partnership with companies that are implicated in the so-called lifestyle diseases appropriate? When does appropriate recognition for donors or volunteers cross the line into facilitating preferential access to care? Ethical decision-making in health philanthropy considers appropriate recognition or partnership in donor relations in the context of the public good with which healthcare institutions are entrusted and the fiduciary responsibilities of hospitals and clinicians to patients.

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Public Perceptions of Journalists' Ethical Motivations

Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly ◽

10.1177/107769909707400103 ◽

1997 ◽

Vol 74 (1) ◽

pp. 23-38 ◽

Cited By ~ 7

Author(s):

Paul S. Voakes

Keyword(s):

Decision Making ◽

Ethical Decision ◽

Ethical Decision Making ◽

Public Perceptions ◽

High Agreement ◽

Organizational Policies ◽

Telephone Surveys ◽

The Public ◽

Journalistic Ethics ◽

Ethical Motivations

Telephone surveys of 376 residents and 60 daily journalists in the same Midwestern county revealed starkly different conceptions of journalistic ethics. Members of the public seemed to believe that journalists' ethics are guided primarily by their occupational norms and competitive pressures, whereas the journalists themselves cited organizational policies, the relevant law, and their own individual reasoning as the primary influences on their ethical decision making. Journalists and public respondents showed surprisingly high agreement, however, on the unacceptability of specific, ethically controversial actions.

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Unexpected expectations: Public reaction to the Facebook emotional contagion study

New Media & Society ◽

10.1177/1461444819876944 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 22 (6) ◽

pp. 1076-1094 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Blake Hallinan ◽

Jed R Brubaker ◽

Casey Fiesler

Keyword(s):

Decision Making ◽

Ethical Decision ◽

Ethical Decision Making ◽

Focal Point ◽

Emotional Contagion ◽

Contextual Approach ◽

The Public ◽

Nature Of Technology ◽

The Media ◽

Public Reaction

How to ethically conduct online platform-based research remains an unsettled issue and the source of continued controversy. The Facebook emotional contagion study, in which researchers altered Facebook News Feeds to determine whether exposure to emotional content influences a user’s mood, has been one focal point of these discussions. The intense negative reaction by the media and public came as a surprise to those involved—but what prompted this reaction? We approach the Facebook study as a mediated controversy that reveals disconnects between how scholars, technologists, and the public understand platform-based research. We examine the controversy from the bottom up, analyzing public reactions expressed in comments on news articles. Our analysis reveals fundamental disagreements about what Facebook is and what a user’s relationship to it should be. We argue that these divergent responses emphasize the contextual nature of technology and research ethics, and conclude with a relational and contextual approach to ethical decision-making.

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The Effects of Professional Role, Decision Context, and Gender on the Ethical Decision Making of Public Accounting Professionals

Behavioral Research in Accounting ◽

10.2308/bria-51090 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 27 (1) ◽

pp. 55-78 ◽

Cited By ~ 12

Author(s):

Donna D. Bobek ◽

Amy M. Hageman ◽

Robin R. Radtke

Keyword(s):

Decision Making ◽

Work Experience ◽

Ethical Decision ◽

Ethical Decision Making ◽

Professional Role ◽

Public Accounting ◽

Decision Context ◽

Accounting Professionals ◽

Males And Females ◽

And Gender

ABSTRACT This study investigates the degree to which professional role (auditor or tax professional), decision context (an audit or tax environment), and gender influence the ethical decision making of public accounting professionals. The primary analysis, including all 134 accounting professionals who participated in our experiment, indicates that these participants are both less likely to indicate they would concede to a client in a contentious situation and less likely to recommend conceding when they are in an audit as opposed to tax context. Furthermore, work experience in auditing (as opposed to tax) is associated with a decreased likelihood of conceding to the client in both contexts. However, when data for males and females are analyzed separately, professional role, context, and moral intensity are significantly related to males' decision making, but are not significant with respect to females' decisions. This suggests that males and females may use different decision-making processes. Possible theoretical explanations for these findings are discussed.

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