Ethical Thinking: Whatarestudents′ moralthoughts?

Abstract

Abstract:The study of ethics is increasingly viewed as an important component of business education. As such, we investigated various real-world ethical scenarios using a self-administered survey instrument that was answered by 136 college students in three different universities? We reviewed the results as they related to gender and ethnicity. A regression analysis revealed that there was no difference, at least from a gender standpoint, in the behaviors between males and females. In fact, in some instances males behaved more ethically, and in other cases females behaved more justly. On the other hand, the regression analysis disclosed that there appears to be different patterns of behavior, from an ethnicity standpoint, between Whites and Hispanics. Still, as researchers (e.g., from an ethnicity standpoint-one being White and two being Latino), we could not easily justify why Whites showed a stronger formal ethical behavior than Latinos. We concluded, based on the responses by the student participants, that theresults are aligned with cultural differences between both ethnic groups.