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FAMILY THERAPISTS' ETHICAL DECISION‐MAKING PROCESSES IN TWO DUTY‐TO‐WARN SITUATIONS
Author(s) -
Burkemper Ellen M.
Publication year - 2002
Publication title -
journal of marital and family therapy
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.868
H-Index - 68
eISSN - 1752-0606
pISSN - 0194-472X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1752-0606.2002.tb00357.x
Subject(s) - beneficence , ethical decision , autonomy , duty , psychology , economic justice , child abuse , social psychology , legal ethics , informed consent , human factors and ergonomics , poison control , engineering ethics , law , medicine , political science , medical emergency , alternative medicine , engineering , pathology
This quantitative study investigated the ethical decision‐making process of 177 Missouri members of the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy using two in‐session duty‐to‐warn scenarios of child abuse and HIV transmission. The components of the critical‐evaluative level of ethical decision making include the lower‐level decision components of personal/therapeutic response, professional ethics, and legal considerations/laws of the State, and the components of the higher‐level decision base, the meta‐ethical principles, which are nonmaleficence, autonomy, beneficence, fidelity, and justice. Statistical results indicated that in the child abuse scenario, professional ethics and legal considerations/laws of the State were considered most important, whereas in the HIV scenario, professional ethics were the preferred lower‐level decision base. Across scenarios, the preferred higher‐level decision base was nonmaleficence. There were differences across the child abuse and HIV scenarios in the perceived significance of the remaining lower‐level decision base items as well as differences in perceived significance and ordering of the remaining meta‐ethical principles. Limitations are discussed.