Ethics Information Seeking and Sharing Among Scientists

As nanotechnologies permeate our daily lives, it is increasingly important that we understand the ethical considerations of these innovations and to what extent scientists attend to these considerations. Guided by the theory of reasoned action and an extended version of that model that includes prior knowledge, sense of responsibility, and ethics involvement, we surveyed a sample of nanoscientists to explore their ethics information seeking and sharing. Path analyses support the theory of reasoned action as a useful framework. Findings suggest that making ethics information more available to scientists and redoubling social pressure to seek and share ethics information may help close the ethics-to-practice gap that exists today.