Ethics competencies for
STEM Disciplines
What competencies can be fostered by
using Noggin’s Brain Processes Map,
online and print material, and other resources to build an inclusive ethics culture in labs and classrooms?
Students and lab personnel should be able to:
Speak Ethics
Ethics is a system for guiding my behavior and my expectations for others' behavior so that we can live together in complex societies.
It has many features but understanding this central purpose allows me to do ethics with confidence that I understand what it is.
Confidently speak an ethics language with concepts and terminology, and apply it in STEM activities
Define What Ethics Is
Understand and employ the idea that a central function of ethics is to guide behavior so that people can live together in complex societies and pursue their individual and common purposes
Promote Inclusivity
by Recognizing that Ethics
Allows for Disagreement
Ethics processes and criteria can include different specific content which yields different ethics judgments, as individuals and cultures determine how best to live together.
Dialogue and Empathy Are Essential
Identify Ethics Issues
Identify ethics issues in STEM subject matter, research and publication activities, and the staffing and management of the lab or classroom
Explain Why an Issue is an Ethics Issue
Understand and explain to others which STEM issues are ethics issues and by what processes and criteria they can be resolved
Understand Ethics Processes & Criteria
Understand not just what actions are ethical, but also how—the processes, and why—the criteria, for making ethics judgments
Understand and Practice the Skills for Ethics Judgment Processes
Understand and practice the skills for doing each of these judgment processes more effectively
Check for Extraneous Influences, Strengths, & Weaknesses of Each Judgment Process
Checking for extraneous influences on my judgment and consider each judgment process’s strengths and weaknesses
Overcome Barriers to Acting Ethically
Ethics is a system for guiding my behavior and my expectations for others' behavior so that we can live together in complex societies.
It has many features but understanding this central purpose allows me to do ethics with confidence that I understand what it is.
Understand and practice the processes of Checking my Narrative and Choosing Tactics when deciding to Act ethically
Confirm or Revise Ethics Processes and Criteria
Understand and practice Looking Back at results after acting, to confirm or adjust my processes and criteria for acting ethically in similar future situations
Promote Inclusivity by Resolving Disagreements
Understand and practice resolving ethics disagreements by listening, to identify how and why I and others made conflicting judgments and decided how to act
Be Motivated by Understanding the Ethical Basis for Ethics Code Provisions
Use ethics criteria of pattern/emotion triggers, ethics tests, and the Crowd’s advice & example to be motivated by the ethical basis for the profession’s Ethics Code provisions in addition to compliance reasons
Identify Most Useful Ethics Processes and Criteria for my Profession
Identify the pattern/emotion triggers, the ethics tests, and the virtues of my crowd and the processes for applying them that are most helpful in the STEM activities of my work or profession to have them ready to use
To Help My Students and Lab Staff to Develop or Improve These Ethics Competencies, Noggin Offers the Following Elements That Can Be Customized For My Situation:
Brief video and text modules that certify individuals as ethics proficient
Training for lab directors and instructors to introduce them to Noggin's features
Annual continuing education on concepts and cases to maintain certification
Web-based/print checklist of terminology, processes, skills, and judgement and action criteria for handy reference
Poster of My Brain on Ethics to hang in the lab as a reference and reminder
Speaker available for department, college, or university level introduction to Noggin