Many questions have been raised in recent years about the values that influence the conduct of scientists and engineers in their professional work, about the sources of uncertainty and strain that may be altering those values, and about what does or should constitute the normative content of graduate education. Questions such as these have stimulated work in professional ethics and ethics and value studies more generally, and have contributed to a revival of interest in the university's ethical climate and responsibilities and its role in the moral development of students. The objective of this project is to provide a data-based examination of the professional values being acquired by graduate students in science and engineering, including an analysis of the value conflicts and ethical problems encountered during their education. The investigators will address this goal by developing and administering a national survey to graduate students and faculty in four disciplines at major departments. They will also conduct field research case studies in those departments in two research universities. The disciplines that will be studied in this phase of the project are civil engineering, experimental psychology, geology and microbiology. An advisory group and consultants provide oversight of the project. Dissemination is expected to include information items in the project's newsletter and in co-sponsors' publications (i.e., American Scientist, CGS Communicator, and Science); presentations to professional meetings; invitational lectures and seminars at various universities; articles in professional and scholarly journals; and a monograph. This study grows out of the successful completion of a planning phase, which resulted in a bibliography, several papers accepted for publication or presentation at professional meetings, several exploratory case studies, and a survey of academic graduate school deans which presents the first systematic data about university policies and practices affecting values and values training in the graduate education of scientists and engineers. The co-principal investigators are very well-qualified; institutional support and student and post-doctoral assistance are appropriate; the research plans are good and should provide rich data about societal and departmental impacts on the professed values of science and engineering graduate students. Results will be widely disseminated and relevant to both researchers and educational policymakers. Support is recommended.
