ETHICAL ISSUES IN OBESITY TREATMENT: ETHICAL DESICION MAKING
The social context. The significance of other people to both yourself and your client is an important source of information for your ethical decision making. Everyone is motivated by the attitudes and opinions of others, especially those who are important in one’s life.
How do the opinions and attitudes of others affect this client’s goals? Obese clients often declare that they wish to lose fat because someone else wants them to, usually a partner but sometimes also another helper such as a physician. A careful examination of the relationship between the client and the other person will tell you something about the ethics of working with the client. For example, the extent to which the client wishes to lose fat for personal reasons, or feels forced into it, is likely to be relevant.
How do the opinions of others affect your goals? Everyone’s job meets a variety of personal needs, including social ones. For example, a client may have been referred to you by someone you respect or value as a source of referrals and do not want to disappoint. You may feel the need to get a good result in order to secure your relationship with the referrer. This need to impress the referrer may make it difficult for you to turn the client down even if there are good reasons to do so. Conversely, you may feel the need to prove your effectiveness as a fat loss agent and may therefore avoid offering help to clients who appear unlikely to achieve impressive fat losses even though they could benefit greatly from your help in other ways.
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