An interview-based survey was carried out with British and American university teachers. In both countries there was widespread (but in the UK, not unanimous) support for the proposition that ethics should be taught to Bioscience students. Reasons included a need to help students engage with the ethical issues associated with their subject and the…

The Challenges and Opportunities for Education About Dual Use Issues in the Life Sciences workshop was held to engage the life sciences community on the particular security issues related to research with dual use potential. More than 60 participants from almost 30 countries took part and included practicing life scientists, bioethics and…

Based on a sample of 22 oncology encounters, this article presents a discourse analysis of positive, neutral, or negative valence in the presentation of three elements of informed consent--purpose, benefits, and risks--in offers to participate in clinical trials. It is found that physicians regularly present these key elements of consent with a…

Bioethics--the study of ethical issues in science and medicine--has grown to become a significant academic and service-oriented discipline with its own research centers, conferences, journals, and degree programs. As these issues have moved to the center of public debate, the law has assumed an increasingly important place in the discipline of…

Objective: This article briefly reviews the history of the relationship between psychiatry and the leadership of ethics committees as a background for examining appropriate educational initiatives to adequately prepare residents and early career psychiatrists to serve as leaders of ethics committees. Method: A Medline review of literature on…

Teaching bioethics might be likened to a rollercoaster ride of twists, turns, and dips that invite teachers and students to experience something of their own edges of fear and comfort. Here the author provides readers with a glimpse into her distinctive approach to teaching bioethics that encourages students to move beyond boundaries of personal…

Explains the importance of integrating bioethics into the science curriculum for student learning. Introduces a workshop designed for middle and high school science teachers teaching bioethics, its application to case studies, and how teachers can fit bioethics into their classroom. (YDS)

This article begins by revisiting the current model of values education (moral education) which has recently been set up in Australian schools. This article problematizes the pedagogical model of teaching values in the direct transmission mode from the perspective of the continuity of experience as central to the philosophies of John Dewey and…

Mentoring and ethics are integral and intersecting components of medical education. Faculty workloads and diffusion of responsibility for teaching impact both ethics and mentoring. In current academic medical center environments, the expectation that traditional one-on-one mentoring relationships will arise spontaneously between medical students…

This article discusses "Family Secrets," a problem-based learning (PBL) curriculum module that focuses on the bioethical implications of genetic testing. In high school biology classrooms throughout New York State, students are using "Family Secrets" to learn about DNA testing; Huntington's disease (HD); and the ethical, legal,…

The functioning of the Kennedy Institute, which aims at dealing with ethical and social questions raised by advances in biosciences and medicine, is described. Three major projects now underway are briefly discussed: a core reference library in bioethics, an Encyclopedia of Bioethics, and a bioethics information retrieval system. (DT)

All citizens will make bioethics decisions as a result of today's biotechnology revolution. The decisions made require citizens to find possible acceptable solutions to dilemmas that have become public issues. In this activity, students practice making decisions in ethical dilemmas after evaluating the influences of their own ethical beliefs and…

Discusses the rationale for and development of an undergraduate bioethics course. Based on experiences with the course, general suggestions are offered to instructors planning to add bioethics to existing curricula. (MA)

Increasingly, the general media cover new advancements and research in the field of biology. Stem cell research, emerging diseases and bioethics are some of the issues gaining public attention. The rate of increase of these new developments creates additional challenges to teachers of biology as they try to remain abreast of new information and…

This guide is intended to help the user become familiar with a selected group of reference tools and resources related to bioethics. Bioethics can be defined as the study of ethical issues which arise in medicine and the life sciences. The literature in this field draws from both the sciences and the social sciences. The following types of…