The Relations between Ethical Reasoning, Moral Intuitions, and Foreign Language among Engineering Students in the US, Netherlands, and China

Background : Ethical knowledge and reasoning have been adopted as the goals of engineering ethics education, and measures of ethical reasoning have been developed by researchers and with participants in mostly the US. But US participants are global outliers on various psychological and social characteristics, and engineering is increasingly global. Further, it is also unclear whether ethical reasoning results in more ethical judgments or behaviors. To address these issues, this study sought to better understand the natures of and relations between ethical reasoning, moral intuitions, and foreign language among engineering students across multiple countries. Students at universities in the US, Netherlands, and China completed the ESIT (Engineering and Science Issues Test), MFQ (Moral Foundations Questionnaire), and demographics items online. Statistical hypothesis testing and correlation analysis were used to examine relations between study variables. Results : (1) Students in the US evidenced higher rates of ethical reasoning than those in the Netherlands or China. (2) Ethics education was associated with lower rates of self-based reasoning. (3) Ethical reasoning was positively related to intuitions about care and fairness, and negatively relations to intuitions about loyalty, authority, and sanctity. (4) Students in China care more about loyalty, authority, and sanctity, and less about care and fairness, than those in the US or Netherlands. (5) Foreign language was associated with higher rates of ethical reasoning and less concern with sanctity. Conclusions : Rather than ethical reasoning, education should aim at reducing self-based reasoning, and researchers must study a broader range of national groups to better understand how language affect ethics education.