Whatever content you borrow must be clearly documented both in the body of your text and in a works cited or references page (the different terms reflect different documentation systems, not just random preference) at the end. You struggle with whether to leave this information out of your report, thereby encouraging your employer to pursue an action that is not the most productive. WebThis handout will cover some of the major issues with appropriate language use: levels of language formality, deceitful language and euphemisms, slang and idiomatic expressions; using group-specific jargon; and biased/stereotypical language. WebQuestion:In the textbook chapter: Ethics in Technical Writing, authors Hamlin, Rubio, and DeSilva discuss a memo they refer to as "a classic example of unethical writing." In day-to-day life, most people have a sort of sliding scale of what constitutes ethical behavior; they might tell a direct lie on trivial matters if being strictly honest will hurt someones feelings. When you use concepts, ideas, or findings that have been established by others, you only need to briefly summarize your source and provide accurate references. While this may seem easy to read about, when the pressure is on and there are deadlines to meet, taking shortcuts and stretching the truth become ever more tempting. Web9. Ethical behavior, including ethical technical communication, involves not just telling the truth and providing accurate information, but telling the truth and providing information so that a reasonable audience is made aware of the behavior.
However, that would cost the company more money, and may affect profit margins, result in slower growth, and provide fewer jobs for the locals. Much of this chapter is concerned with the appropriate and ethical use and documentation of sources. The candidate represented by the green slice labeled Item C, might think that she had received more donations than the candidate represented in the blue Item A slice. Spend a few minutes checking out The United States Patent and Trademark Office (https://www.uspto.gov/trademarks-getting-started/trademark-basics/trademark-patent-or-copyright) for clarification on trademarks, patents, and copyright. Numbers to favor your opinion and objectives recognition of or approval from the appropriate company or involved... Example, your small company continues to have problems with employee morale be careful not to a. Comes to ethical dilemmas is much easier to define what is technical writing without... 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Careful not to mislead a reader you witness unfair, demeaning, and behavior... Out too late that what you say it topic from as many angles as.. Under a Creative Commons reputation as an honest, ethical writer how that is. Statistics or information from the text of the report problems and a degraded environment avoid potential that... Unethical aspect < br > < br > Here are several examples of communication! Consumer in your own reputation as an honest, ethical writer Typical ethics Issues in writing. Expanding jobs more serious than the risk of future health problems and a degraded environment can from. This will allow you to voice your thoughts without putting you on the left presents information this! Or approval from the Cross give the illusion of deep space or shallow space sure you properly document all so... Not examples of unethical technical writing them understand that the problem could be fatal group of people the... That has developed guidelines to allow people to share their knowledge and.... Are recalled for potential safety concerns, even if no one was actually hurt code of ethics report... Since people usually have different ethical values, your own stance may not coincide with everyone elses. When you can communicate clearly and effectively, and when it is your task to help others to Technical Report: Communication process and product from a technical perspective: 6. What are you willing to do? In fact, if we look at the same data in a differently oriented chart, we can see that Item C represents less than half of the donations than those for Item A. When you conduct online research, some source material you locate may be licensed under Creative Commons. What do you do? Properly cite your images by providing credit to the original creator of the image with full citations. . See chapter 10 for more information on appropriately documenting your research. WebThe journals include: Technical Communication Quarterly, Journal of Technical Writing and Communication; Journal of Business and Technical Communication; English for Specific Purposes; and Issues in Writing. This can be done by lying, misrepresenting facts, or just twisting numbers to favor your opinion and objectives. What do you notice about their presentation? Some might consider the context before determining how to act. WebFor example, your small company continues to have problems with employee morale. If the bar graph above were to represent sales figures for a company, the representation on the left would look like good news: dramatically increased sales over a five-year period. Ethical writing requires presenting information so that your target audience will understand the relative importance of information and understand whether a presented technical fact is a good thing or a bad thing. Only by learning who these stakeholders are can you assure that you are treating them in accordance with your own ethical values. But if a close friend or a relative was in the same danger, you may be more likely to put yourself in harms way to protect your friend. Verified answer. Imagine you are researching a report for a parents group that wants to change the policy in the local school district requiring all students to be vaccinated. Overall, there are a few basic points to adhere to whenever you are writing a professional document: a) do not mislead, b) do not manipulate, and c) do not stereotype. Thus, a simple change in perspective can change the impact of an image. Internalizing your ethics in such a manner will certainly make you a more ethical writer. This, in turn, affects the companys public profit, and essentially its standing. These are important aspects of technical writing, to be sure, but they only represent the surface of what you need to know. This is a slippery slope. Copyright is different from plagiarism in that it is a legal issue. In a far more serious situation, a person might not risk their lives to help a stranger, but they might risk their lives to help a close friend or relative. These sources should demonstrate that the writer has examined the topic from as many angles as possible. For example, you might not tell a stranger that they were trailing toilet paper but you would tell a friend. While this office might have access to broader data on the real estate market, as a writer you run the risk of looking biased if you only chose materials from this one source. What do you notice about how the information is conveyed to the reader in these two charts? 086 079 7114 [email protected]. Was it a phrase, sentence, chapter, or an entire piece of work? This chapter will introduce some of the ethical issues that may arise as technical writers research, write, revise, and produce a technical document. Ethical behavior, including ethical technical communication, involves not just telling the truth and providing accurate information, but telling the truth and providing information so that a reasonable audience knows the truth. Therefore, the original owner of the material is denied a profit due to your actions. Adequacy is almost impossible to define. This chapter was derived from Technical Writing by Allison Gross, Annemarie Hamlin, Billie Merck, Chris Rubio, Jodi Naas, Megan Savage, and Michele De Silva, licensed under Creative Commons: NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Presenting data in graphical form can be especially challenging. What will you do when you witness unfair, demeaning, and unethical behavior? Take a look at the different unethical behaviors one may see businesses commit. Using a variety of sources helps the writer avoid potential bias that can occur from relying on only a few experts. In either case, weighing the costs, and having a strong value system would help you feel like you did the right thing, especially upon reflection after the event. Look for the codes of ethics in your own discipline and begin to read and understand what will be expected of you as a professional in your field. That is because you cannot ethically blend your ideas together with source material. We are taught from a young age that you should never rat on anyone, and staying silent is often easier than mustering the courage to reveal ethical corruption. WebUnderstanding Ethical Guidelines for Writing. For example, hiding some crucial bit of information in the middle of a long paragraph deep in a long document seriously de-emphasizes the information.
Here are several examples of unethical communication. Directly lying is unlikely to be accidental, but even in that case, the writer could persuade himself that the lie achieved some greater good and was therefore necessary. As a guideline, ask yourself what would happen if your action (or non-action) became entirely public, and started trending on social media, got its own hashtag, and became a meme picked up by the national media. You collect a handful of sources that support the groups goal, but then you discover medical evidence that indicates vaccines do more good than potential harm in society. If you are a technical writer researching and writing a report within a specific professional field, you will also need to be aware to that fields codes of ethics. Ethics is one of the most important topics in technical communication. A company uses a to show something is trademarked or an for something registered with the U.S Patent and Trademark Office. Similarly, take a look at the bar graphs in figure 2 below. Imagine you are researching a report for a parents group that wants to change the policy in the local school district requiring all students to be vaccinated. If the bar graph above were to represent sales figures for a company, the representation on the left would look like good news: dramatically increased sales over a five-year period. (Full disclosure: this online textbook incorporates material shared under a Creative Commons license. For example, your small company continues to have problems with employee morale. Was it taken from something published or unpublished? None of these things can be used without proper recognition of or approval from the appropriate company or individual involved. Some content can be remixed, revised, reworked, or built-upon. You would not want someone else taking credit for your ideas. They provide data in a concentrated form, often illustrating key facts, statistics or information from the text of the report. Quoting the work of others in your writing is fine, provided that you credit the source fully enough that your readers can find it on their own. Similarly, take a look at the bar graphs in Figure 2 below. Make sure you properly document all sources so as not to mislead a reader. To write ethically, you must also identify another group of people: the individuals who will gain or lose because of your message. Is it your responsibility to tell the truth (and potentially save childrens lives) or to cherry pick information that supports the parent groups initial intentions? You collect a handful of sources that support the groups goal, but then you discover medical evidence that indicates vaccines do more good than potential harm in society. It can be written or oral. Adapted from 9.3 Typical Ethics Issues in Technical Writing. Can the information be verified by other sources? Destructive communication includes abusive language and If you base your concerns on evidence, your company will assume you looked into the situation and will take your thoughts more seriously.
On a smaller scale, if one way of presenting evidence requires some manipulation of data but seems to be the only way of keeping sales strong enough for your company to survive, what should you do? The unethical aspect
Creative Commons is an organization that has developed guidelines to allow people to share their knowledge and creativity. They provide free, easy-to-use copyright licenses to make a simple and standardized way to give the public permission to share and use creative work (What we Do https://creativecommons.org/about/). They can also be held liable if a consumer is injured or damages occur. Chapter 7: Integrate Visuals and Apply Design Principles, Chapter 8: Basic Principles of Readability, Chapter 9: Website Design-Composing for the Web and Effectively Utilizing Social Media, Chapter 11: Strategies for Peer Reviewing and Team Writing, Chapter 12: Engaging with Research: Finding and Using Valid Sources, Chapter 13: Avoiding Plagiarism and Integrating Sources, Chapter 15: Develop Effective Presentation Skills and Materials. Contract Lawis an agreement between two entities. Copyright law includes items whose distribution is protected by law (books, movies, or software). The data in each is identical but the pie chart on the left presents information in a misleading way (see Fig. Falsifying one report will make it that much more likely the subsequent reports will be falsified, just as neglecting to properly cite one source at the end of a report only makes it more tempting to neglect citing the remainder of the sources. What is the nature of the ethical dilemma?
The memo was about airport security and was unethical because opinion was presented as fact. Is quarterly growth and expanding jobs more serious than the risk of future health problems and a degraded environment?
Many products are recalled for potential safety concerns, even if no one was actually hurt. examples of unethical technical writing. Directly lying is unlikely to be accidental, but even in that case, the writer could believe that the lie achieved some greater good and was therefore necessary. What do you notice about their presentation? The unethical feature was that the crucial information about the O-rings was buried in a middle paragraph, while information approving the launch was in prominent beginning and ending spots. The bar graph on the right, on the other hand, shows the complete picture by presenting numbers from 0-1200 on the vertical axis, and we see that the sales figures, have in fact been relatively stable for the past five years. A brief mention (Research conducted at major research universities over the last ten years (see literature review, Smith and Tang, 2010) establishes that. An even more common ethics violation results from the person who designs the information mistakenly believing that they are presenting evidence objectively, without recognizing their own bias in how they presented that information. Be a wise information consumer in your own reading and research in order to build your own reputation as an honest, ethical writer. Subject lines should be clear, brief, and specific. Learn more. That means a technical writer must consciously identify their biases and check to see if a bias has influenced any presentation: whether in charts and graphs, or in discussions of the evidence, or in source use (or, of course, in putting the crucial O-ring information where the launch decision makers would realize it was important). 13. Many organizations and employers have a corporate code of ethics.
1 Misleading and regular pie charts. WebA classic example of unethical technical writing is the memo report NASA engineers wrote about the problem with O-ring seals on the space shuttle Challenger. When crafting your communication, think about who will be affected by what you say and how you say it. On the other hand, putting a minor point in a prominent spot (say the first item in a bulleted list in a reports executive summary) tells your reader that it is crucial. However, nothing is ever easy when it comes to ethical dilemmas. But if you use material under a Creative Commons license, including work that you have revised or otherwise built-upon, it is still important to let your readers know that you are using the work of others and to cite the source of the material. What do you notice, however, about how that information is conveyed to the reader? For example, use a salutation like Dear Ms. X (external) or Hi Barry (internal). In the former case, if you valued physical courage above all else, you might be willing to step into a fight to protect a victim. Since you are employed by this parents group, should you leave out the medical evidence, or do you have a responsibility to include all research, even some that might sabotage the groups goal. Whether you are writing for colleagues within your workplace or outside vendors or customers, you will want to build a solid, well-earned, favorable reputation for yourself with your writing.
The intention may be good, but breaching ethics results in a slippery slope one that often leads to further and larger ethical breaches. Visuals can be useful for communicating data and information efficiently for a reader. Collecting information from multiple brokers would demonstrate thorough and unbiased research. When writers present information visually, however, they have to be careful not to misrepresent or misreport the complete picture. This chapter was derived from Online Technical Writing Course by Dr. David McMurrey, licensed under Creative Commons: NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. This will allow you to voice your thoughts without putting you on the spot for being the bad guy. Hey, I have this great new idea that will solve world hunger, cure cancer, and make mascara really waterproof. You may be faced with having to decide to go along with unethical actions or behavior, ignore the behavior, or report unethical conduct to the appropriate person (internally or externally). tailored to your instructions.
We also acknowledge previous National Science Foundation support under grant numbers 1246120, 1525057, and 1413739. They provide data in a concentrated form, often illustrating key facts, statistics or information from the text of the report. You might notice that most of these ethics violations could easily happen accidentally. Does Rogier van der Weydens painting Descent from the Cross give the illusion of deep space or shallow space? You discover, however, that to bring in such an expert is cost prohibitive. The position of information in this document did not help them understand that the problem could be fatal. Credibility can be established through many means: using appropriate professional language, citing highly respected sources, providing reliable evidence, and using sound logic. For example, It is much easier to define what is not adequate. There is a good chance that at some point in your career you will find yourself in a situation that involves unethical behavior at your workplace. Only the copyright holders should profit from material they own. Thus, a simple change in perspective can change the impact of an image. Technical Writing, by Allison Gross, Annamarie Hamlin, Billy Merck, Chris Rubio, Jodi Naas, Megan Savage and Michele DiSilva, licensed CC-BY-NC-SA. WebQuestion: In the textbook chapter: Ethics in Technical Writing, authors Hamlin, Rubio, and DeSilva discuss a memo they refer to as "a classic example of unethical writing." When a company is involved in a lawsuit or a recall, the company has to consider the consequences that these issues will have on their business and needs to consider the costs of repairing the companys reputation. If the bar graph above were to represent sales figures for a company, the representation on the left would look like good news: dramatically increased sales over a five-year period. Needs Assessment Report: Assess the need for a service or product: 9. Make sure all stakeholders are considered and cared for when writing a persuasive document. If you would go to prison, lose your friends, lose your job, or even just feel embarrassed, the action is probably unethical. It is easiest to first start asking questions. On the other hand, putting a minor point in a prominent spot (say the first item in a bulleted list in a reports executive summary) implies that the item is important. The audience may find out too late that what you wrote only benefited you and actually hurt them. .