Exploring Bioethics - NIH Office of Science Education - National ...

Challenges in TeachingBioethics and HowExploring Bioethics Can HelpExploring Bioethics offers several strategies for overcomingthe challenges in teaching bioethics successfully.Challenge #1: Science Teachers LackBackground in Bioethical AnalysisThe nature of evidence is different in scientific and ethicalinquiry. Most science educators have been trainedonly in how to build scientific justifications, which arebased primarily on empirical evidence. Ethical justificationsrequire empirical evidence (from both the sciencesand social sciences), too, but in addition, one must takea set of important ethical considerations into account.Thus, teaching bioethics requires a shift in the paradigmthat both science teachers and their students are accustomedto using.Unless they have taken courses in ethics, science teachersmay not have been exposed to some of the conceptsand procedures ethicists use and, therefore, may feelunprepared to conduct, facilitate, and teach ethicalanalysis in the classroom.How Exploring Bioethics Can HelpTo address this challenge, Exploring Bioethics focusesattention on the four key questions and core ethicalconsiderations described above. You will introduce thesequestions and considerations in Module 1, and studentswill repeatedly apply them in the subsequent modules.Easy to remember, they allow students to enter intorich conversations that do not oversimplify the ethicalissues. The key questions and core ethical considerationsserve as a framework for student thinking in the ethicaldomain. As they work through different modules, studentsshould develop the habit of always asking thesequestions when confronted with ethical choices.If you wish to read more about bioethics and theteaching of bioethics, see the Resources for TeachingBioethics listed on page 20 of this Introduction. Also,be sure to go to the Exploring Bioethics Web site, whereyou will find many helpful teacher support materialsand updates that will enhance your ability to teach thissupplement (http://science.education.nih.gov/supplements/bioethics).Challenge #2: Many People Have TroubleThinking Critically about Ethical IssuesResearch by cognitive psychologists, such as Kuhn,Cheney, and Weinstock (2000), indicates that very fewadults, let alone adolescents, develop critical-reasoningabilities in the ethical domain. Adolescents in particularcan be especially rigid in their thinking. This rigidity cancome in many forms. Some people tend to rely on rulesand often resist delving deeply into the reasons for therules or exploring whether there might ever be appropriateexceptions. The insistence on rules without reasons orexceptions is called moral absolutism.Many people take a wholly subjective and relativisticstance, believing that it is impossible to assess whetherone ethical opinion is any more justified than another.One position, which is called ethical subjectivism, is sometimesalso stated this way: “It’s a free country; I have aright to my opinion, and you have a right to yours, andthere is nothing more to discuss.” That statement shutsdown thoughtful reflection and critical thinking. Ethicalrelativism is the view that the correct ethical opiniondepends on, or is relative to, a particular culture or society.Indeed, many people often confuse tolerance and respectfor diversity—key features of a pluralistic society—with ethical subjectivism or ethical relativism. However,respect for diversity and critical thinking are not mutuallyexclusive. Individuals are free to make their own conclusions,but they should also strive to ensure that theirbeliefs are well informed and based on good reasons thatcan be explained to other people, especially people whomay disagree with them.How Exploring Bioethics Can HelpThe next section, Tips for Conducting Ethics Discussions(page 14), contains many useful ideas for helpingstudents avoid the traps of moral absolutism and ethicalsubjectivism or relativism. In addition, the modulesinclude many pedagogical strategies to encourage studentsto think about the reasons for their choices and toengage respectfully with people who hold a broad rangeof views.Challenge #3: People’s Fear that DeeplyHeld Religious Beliefs Will Be AttackedExploring Bioethics does not aim to change students’minds or challenge their deeply held beliefs, whether12 Exploring Bioethics