Psychologists encounter many ethical quandaries in their work. These questions may arise because of psychologists' lack of familiarity with the American Psychological Association (APA) Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct (referred to hereafter as the APA Ethics Code; APA, 2017), practice standards, or state and federal laws. However, at other times psychologists encounter situations for which the APA Ethics Code or laws do not provide explicit direction on how to act. In these situations, having well-developed ethical-decision-making skills enhances the ability of psychologists to act in ways that are consistent with the moral principles of the profession.As discussed in Chapter 2, psychologists, like other moral agents, have a tendency to "think fast" when they encounter an ethical dilemma. That is to say, the situation may elicit System 1 thinking, which is thinking that is fast and automatic and occurs without effort. Although System 1 thinking is adequate for most types of situations, psychologists who face ethical
ETHICAL DECISIon MAKIngCopyright American Psychological Association. Not for further distribution.practical ethics for psychologists dilemmas are encouraged to slow down and use System 2 thinking when making important ethical decisions. System 2 thinking is slow and deliberate and requires conscious effort (see Kahneman, 2011, for a more detailed description of System 1 and System 2 thinking).In this chapter, we review the areas related to ethics in which psychologists need to apply their System 2 thinking skills to decision making. We then present a five-step ethical-decision-making model (Bransford & Stein, 1993; Härtel & Härtel, 1997), which can be used for most ethical dilemmas. In later chapters, we demonstrate how to apply the five-step model to address specific ethical dilemmas.
AREAS To APPLy ETHICAL-DECISIon-MAKIng SKILLSPsychologists need to use ethical-decision-making skills when one or more of the following circumstances are present: (a) an applicable ethical or legal standard requires them to use their professional judgment; (b) the APA Ethics Code or laws are silent; and/or (c) the APA Ethics Code conflicts with the law or organizational policies. Each of these areas is discussed in more detail in the sections that follow.
Professional JudgmentMany standards of the APA Ethics Code require the use of professional judgment in their implementation. This is particularly true when the APA Ethics Code uses modifiers such as reasonably, appropriately, or potentially. For example, Standard 10.01a, Informed Consent to Therapy, states that "psychologists inform clients/patients as early as is feasible in the therapeutic relationship about the nature and anticipated course of therapy, fees, involvement of third parties, and limits of confidentiality." Consequently, psychologists have to determine when it is feasible to reach that agreement. Although the decision is routine in most situations, there are times, such as when patients are in severe distress, when psychologists m...