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Psychiatry presents a unique array of difficult ethical questions. However, a major challenge is to approach psychiatry in a way that does justice to the real ethical issues. Recently there has been a growing body of research in empirical psychiatric ethics, and an increased interest in how empirical and philosophical methods can be combined. Empirical Ethics in Psychiatry demonstrates how ethics can engage more closely with the reality of psychiatric practice and shows how empirical methodologies from the social sciences can help foster this link.

The book is divided into two sections. In the first section there are discussions of the possibility of empirical ethics from a theoretical standpoint and an overview of the history of empirical medical ethics in general. The second, larger section is made up of chapters, discussing specific research projects in empirical psychiatric ethics. The contributors reflect on their choice of method: how and why they combine empirical and philosophical work, and how the two approaches relate to each other. The chapters in the second part thus have two purposes. The first is to present examples of empirical ethics in psychiatry; the second is to reflect on the way in which empirical research can support ethical analysis.

Empirical Ethics in Psychiatry is a unique contribution to bioethics and will be fascinating reading for all those working within the field, as well as mental health care professionals.

Chapter One: Introduction “The ethical basis of all [medical] research is that information gained from one patient's experience should, where feasible, ...

Introduction The present volume contains the proceedings of the First International Conference on Medical Ethics which took place in Nicosia, from the 24th ...

The practice of clinical medicine is inextricably linked with the need for moral values and ethical principles. The study of medical ethics is, therefore, rightly assuming an increasingly significant place in undergraduate and postgraduate medical courses and in allied health curricula. Making Sense of Medical Ethics offers a no-nonsense introduction to the principles of medical ethics, as applied to the everyday care of patients, the development of novel therapies and the undertaking of pioneering basic medical research. Written from a practical rather than a philosophical perspective, the authors call upon their extensive experience of clinical practice, research and teaching to illustrate how ethical principles can be applied in different "real-life" situations. Making Sense of Medical Ethics encourages readers to understand the principles of medical ethics as they apply to clinical practice; explore and evaluate common misconceptions; consider the ethics underlying any medical decision; and as a result, to realize that a good appreciation of medical ethics will help them to practice more effectively in the future.

Ethics is normative; ethics indicates, in broad terms, what researchers should do. For example, researchers should respect human participants. Empirical study tells us what actually happens. Empirical research is often needed to fine-tune the best ways to achieve normative objectives, for example, to discover how best to achieve the dual aims of gaining important knowledge and respecting participants. Ethical decision making by scientists and institutional review boards should not be based on hunches and anecdotes (e.g., about such matters as what information potential research participants would want to know and what they understand, or what they consider to be acceptable risks). These questions should be answered through empirical research. Some of the preceding articles in this special issue illustrate uses of empirical research on research ethics. This article places empirical research on research ethics into broader perspective and challenges investigators to use the tools of their disciplines to proactively solve ethical problems for which there currently exist no empirically proven solutions.

This collection brings together original essays demonstrating the cutting edge of philosophical research in medical ethics. With contributions from a range of established and up-and-coming authors, it examines topics at the forefront of medical technology, such as ethical issues raised by developments in how we research stem cells and genetic engineering, as well as new questions raised by methodological changes in how we approach medical ethics.

Introduction TEMPE (Teaching Ethics: Material for Practitioner Education) is a two-year research project (2000-2002) funded by the European Commission ...

Empirical research pertaining to cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR), clinician behaviors related to do-not-resuscitate (DNR) orders and substituted judgment suggests potential contributions to medical ethics. Research quantifying the likelihood of surviving CPR points to the need for further philosophical analysis of the limitations of the patient autonomy in decision making, the nature and definition of medical futility, and the relationship between futility and professional standards. Research on DNR orders has identified barriers to the goal of patient involvement in these life and death discussions. The initial data on surrogate decision making also points to the need for a reexamination of the moral basis for substituted judgment, the moral authority of proxy decision making and the second-order status of the best interests standard. These examples of empirical research suggest that an interplay between empirical research, ethical analysis and policy development may represent a new form of interdisciplinary scholarship to improve clinical medicine.

In medical ethics, business ethics, and some branches of political philosophy (multi-culturalism, issues of just allocation, and equitable distribution) the literature increasingly combines insights from ethics and the social sciences. Some authors in medical ethics even speak of a new phase in the history of ethics, hailing "empirical ethics" as a logical next step in the development of practical ethics after the turn to "applied ethics." The name empirical ethics is ill-chosen because of its associations with "descriptive ethics." Unlike descriptive ethics, however, empirical ethics aims to be both descriptive and normative. The first question on which I focus is what kind of empirical research is used by empirical ethics and for which purposes. I argue that the ultimate aim of all empirical ethics is to improve the context-sensitivity of ethics. The second question is whether empirical ethics is essentially connected with specific positions in meta-ethics. I show that in some kinds of meta-ethical theories, which I categorize as broad contextualist theories, there is an intrinsic need for connecting normative ethics with empirical social research. But context-sensitivity is a goal that can be aimed for from any meta-ethical position.