An Empirical Study on Engineers’ Professional Ethics Education Experience and Ethical Behaviors

摘要

While considerable attention has been paid in the past to engineers’ ethical education, little empirical evidence has been found to establish the relationship between individual ethical education experiences and ethical attitude or behavior. This study is to discover the current situation of the professional ethics education of engineers in Taiwan’s construction industry and to verify which types of ethical education experiences can really shape suitable ethical attitudes for construction practitioners. 526 valid samples, composed of engineers working for clients, A/E and general contractors, were collected in this study. These engineers can be categorized into four types according to their ethical education experiences. The measurement tool was developed based on past research and various codes of ethics. The reliability of the Likert measurement results was quite consistent, with a high Cronbach’s α value. The investigation showed only 13% of the engineers took courses related to professional ethics at school. Through the questionnaire survey, factor analysis and reliability analysis, this study explored the factors of professional beliefs and ethical behaviors of construction industry engineers. According to the three ttests on the three engineer types with different ethical education experiences and those without any ethical education experiences, it is found ethical education experiences from on-job training and the strict regulations of organizations have a significantly more positive effect on ethical attitude development. This study found suitable on-job ethical training and ethical codes can have a positive effect on engineers’ professional beliefs and ethical behaviors. Based on the findings of this study, a general increase in the quantity and quality of ethics education or trainings can facilitate the promotion of professional ethical codes to a significant level and it is noteworthy for the construction industry.