Abstract:
Students were presented with a questionnaire containing 16 hypothetical scenarios describing ethical dilemmas related to computer and information ethics, and were asked to respond to 23 questions about these 16 scenarios. These were closed-ended multiple-choice questions with a space at the end of each question for comments. Two hundred eleven students in grades 10, 11, and 12 (119 boys and 92 girls) who were enrolled in computer classes (Spring 2003) in a high school in a mid-western state of the United States participated in this study. The study also examined if students made any distinction between computer and non-computer ethical issues that are similar, such as copying software versus copying books. Students’ views about these issued were analyzed according to principled ethics, as defined by stages 5 and 6 of Kohlberg’s theory, for both boys and girls separately to find out if there were any differences between the boys’ and the girls’ responses.

Major finding of this research can be summarized in five points. First, the combined average percentage of boys and girls who followed principled ethics was 76.94%, and the number of girls choosing answers in agreement with principled ethics was generally about 10% higher than that of boys. Second, several students knew what is right and what is wrong but were ready to do the wrong if it had benefit to them, and if they knew they were not going to be caught. Results showed that 54.5 were ready to make unauthorized free calls, and 15.2% were ready to commit a computer fraud to make money if they knew they were not going to be caught. Third, the percentage of students who answered 90% or more according to principled ethics reached 32.7% (27.7% for boys and 39.1% for girls). Fourth, 67.3% of the students who participated in this study departed from principled ethics in the area of making unauthorized free calls, 53.1% in the area of using students’ homepage to insult teachers, 47.8% in the area of copying software without permission, 41.8% in the area of copying books without permission, 38% in the area of copying songs from the Internet without permission and offering them for sale, 25.8% in the area of computer fraud, and 18.7% in the area of hacking for fun without causing any damage and without sharing any information with others.

Fifth, students made a distinction between computer and non-computer ethics in three areas. (a) Students differentiated between using the homepage to insult a teacher and distributing a print out of it - many of them supported a student’s right to insult her teacher using profane language, but opposed distributing a printout of it. (b) While many students allowed hacking for fun, they did not allow breaking into file cabinets. (c) While boys made no distinction between software copyright and book copyright, girls did. Some of them would allow copying software, but would not allow copying books without permission. It is to be noted also that there were significant differences between the boys’ and the girls’ responses in areas of paying back for money made through computer fraud, distributing a printout of a homepage insulting a teacher, hacking for fun, and copying reports from the internet without giving credit to authors. In each of these areas, the number of girls choosing answers in agreement with principled ethics was higher than that of boys.