Measuring the quality of the deliberation in moral case deliberations: A coding scheme

AC Molewijk, Hylke Jellema, Swanny Kremer, Anne Ruth Mackor

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleProfessional

12 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Moral Case Deliberation (MCD) is an up and coming form of ethics support wherein clinical professionals deliberate about moral questions they face in their work. So far, it has been unclear what quality of deliberation in MCD is entailed and how to evaluate this quality. This article proposes a coding scheme that fits the theoretical background of MCD and allows researchers to evaluate the quality of the deliberation in MCDs. We consider deliberation in MCD to be of good quality when participants enrich their own understanding of a case by being exposed to the viewpoints of others. In order to have such an enriching effect, the deliberation in an MCD ought to involve different kinds of arguments from the perspectives of different stakeholders and in favour of different resolutions to the case; and the process of deliberation ought to be critical but constructive.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)277-285
Number of pages9
JournalBioethics
Volume31
Issue number4
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 May 2017

Keywords

  • Clinical ethics support
  • Coding scheme
  • Deliberative quality
  • Dialogical ethics
  • Moral case deliberation
  • Pragmatic hermeneutics

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