Relationship between student characteristics and ethics: implications for educators

Journal of Instructional Psychology, Sept, 2003 by Siva Sankaran, Tung Bui

> This study hopes to have contributed to our knowledge on the relationship between ethics and the student characteristics of competitiveness, personality type, age, gender and major. Currently, the research is ongoing in identifying additional factors. We also hope to replicate this study with a larger sample distributed over a wider geographic region to confirm the generalizability of the reported findings.

Figure 2: Distribution of sample by Major

BusAdmn            n = 77
Finance            n = 62
Accounting         n = 50
InfoSystems        n = 41
OtherBusMajors     n = 50
Marketing          n = 48
NonBusMajors       n = 17


Group Statistics

                                                              Std.
                                                  Std.        Error
                                     N     Mean   Deviation   Mean

Ethics Score (ES) Less Competitive   268   4.11   .619        .038
                  Group (CS < =3)

                  High Competitive    77   3.61   .361        .084
                  Group (CS > 3)


Independent Samples Test

                    t-test for Equality of Means

                                       Sig.          Mean   Std. Error
                      t      df   (2-tailed)   Difference   Difference

Ethics Score (ES)   6.000   343        .000           .50         .084


Table 2: Relationship between Ethics Scores (ES) and Personality
Type Score (PTS)

                     Group Statistics

                                                    Std.     Std. Error
                                     N    Mean   Deviation      Mean

Ethics Score (ES)   Personality
                    Type B Group
                    (PTS<=3)        219   4.14      .579        .039

                    Personality
                    Type A Group
                    (PTS>3)         126   3.76      .770        .069

                    Independent Samples Test

                               t-test for Equality of Means

                                      Sig.        Mean      Std. Error
                      t     df    (2-tailed)   Difference   Difference

Ethics Score (ES)   5.174   343      .000         .38          .073


Table 4: Relationship between Ethics Score (ES) and Gender

                     Group Statistics

                                                    Std.     Std. Error
                                     N    Mean   Deviation      Mean

Ethics Score (ES)   Women           186   4.03      .694        .051
                    Men             159   3.96      .662        .052

                    Independent Samples Test

                                t-test for Equality of Means

                                      Sig.        Mean      Std. Error
                       t    df    (2-tailed)   Difference   Difference

Ethics Score (ES)    .966   343      .335         .07          .073


Table 5: Ethics Scores (ES) across Majors

Descriptives

Ethics Score (ES)

                                         Std.
                      N      Mean     Deviation     Std. Error

Business Admn         77     4.07        .711          .081
Finance               62     3.94        .715          .091
Accounting            50     4.01        .595          .084
Info Systems          41     4.43        .477          .074
Other Bus Majors      50     3.94        .672          .095
Marketing             48     3.72        .690          .100
NonBus Majors         17     3.84        .605          .147
Total                 345    4.00        .679          .037

ANOVA

Ethics Score (ES)

                      Df        Mean       Square     F Sig.

Between Groups         6       2.070        4.780      .000
Within Groups        338       .433
Total                344

Figure 6: Age distribution among Majors

BusAdmn             24.1
Finance             24.8
Acctng              25.0
InfoSys             26.8
OtherBusMjrs        26.4
Marketing           23.9
NonBusMjrs          24.2

Figure 7: Ethics by gender across competitiveness levels

                Women          Men

Low              4.2           4.0
High             3.4           3.8