"LOTS of New Year’s resolutions are being made — and no doubt ignored — at this time of year. But there’s one that’s probably not even on many lists and should be: Act more ethically. Most people, if pressed, would acknowledge that they could use an ethical tuneup. Maybe last year they fudged some numbers at work. Dented a car and failed to leave a note. Remained silent when a friend made a racist joke. The problem, research shows, is that how we think we’re going to act when faced with a moral decision and how we really do act are often vastly different."
Issues and developments related to ethics, information, and technologies, examined in the ethics and intellectual property graduate courses I teach at the University of Pittsburgh School of Computing and Information. My Bloomsbury book "Ethics, Information, and Technology" will be published in Summer 2025. Kip Currier, PhD, JD
Showing posts with label bystander effect. Show all posts
Showing posts with label bystander effect. Show all posts
Monday, January 27, 2014
In Life and Business, Learning to Be Ethical; New York Times, 1/10/14
Alina Tugend, New York Times; In Life and Business, Learning to Be Ethical:
Sunday, December 29, 2013
Whose Responsibility Is It Anyway? A New Approach to Fighting Cyberbullying; HuffingtonPost.com, 12/23/13
Joanna Finkelstein, HuffingtonPost.com; Whose Responsibility Is It Anyway? A New Approach to Fighting Cyberbullying:
"A 2011 study by researchers at Ohio University, University of North Carolina, and University of Pennsylvania found that people are less likely to help someone if there is someone else present and if they strongly fear embarrassment...
Anti-cyberbullying campaigns should focus more on the bystanders. They should emphasize that no one should encourage or support the bully and that it is each individual's responsibility to intervene when she/he witnesses cyberbullying.
Helping a victim should be seen as something positive and empowering, not embarrassing. Further, it should be portrayed as what should be done and what is done.
Once one person helps a victim, the false consensus is destroyed and others are much more likely to also help the victim. Observers could calmly confront the bully, support the victim, or use an anonymous resource to report the bullying. These are simple and effective steps that are likely to spread and become even more powerful.
Even if the current campaigns are preventing some bullying, they are not eliminating it. In order to end bullying, the observers need to play a more prominent role. The current bystanders can become active fighters in stopping and preventing future cyberbullying."
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