The Salience and Pertinence of Ethics: When Journalists do and Don't Think for themselves

Abstract

An experiment applied Carter's Paradigm of Affective Relations and Kelman's Functional Theory to journalism ethics. Two ways of making ethical decisions were studied. One way, the use of internalized ethical orientations, was found to be a highly salient way of resolving ethical dilemmas, one that would lead to consistent ethical decision making across situations. The second way, following ethical guides, was found to be a less salient way of ethical decision making. Following ethical guides, however, was found to be pertinent to ethical situations if the guides and situations shared attributes.