Journal 1
Course Date: 10/22/2012-10/28/2012
Main Topic: Six stages of Moral and Ethical Development
Today I learned about the six stages of Moral and Ethical Development. Although the moral and
ethical levels are graded by six stages, I think in the real world, it is hard to determine a person is
in which stage. Take myself for example. To me, I think the reasons of being moral in all the six
stages are acceptable. Just like most ordinary people, I am a good ci+zen, obeying the law and
doing ethic-accepted things in daily life. The reasons why I choose to be an ethical person are
multiple. Firstly, I am ethical because I want to get approval, because I want to avoid trouble, and
also because I believe that it would be very bene.cial of being ethical in a long-run. Secondly, I
can reach the ethical level of obeying orders without asking the sense of the orders because I
think moral and ethical principles are very subjec+ve rather than objective. There are always
di0erent opinions exist between people. We cannot reach the ONLY right choice. To resolve the
conflict caused by people’s differences, we need to set a standard order in advance and then
obey this order simultaneously without excep+on. Thirdly, I am also eager to getting involved in
maintain universally accepted morality and merits in our society. I think the passion of keeping
and developing merits and virtues are stemmed from the humanity in every person’s nature.
Consequently, we all will .ght against the an+-human orders such as fascist. Furthermore, we
also will feel ful.lled by doing just things and by being a hero of the whole world——that is
another form of searching bene.ts from being ethical.
In conclusion, in my point of view, to say which stage are we in, we need to take the speci.c
environment and situation into considera+on. At the mention of speci.c situation, I am very
expec+ng the upcoming ethical issues and rules in the accounting professional .eld in the
following lessons!
Journal 2
Course Date: 10/22/2012-10/28/2012
Main Topic: General overview of the codes of professional conduct
Today I learned the General Overview of the Codes of Professional Conduct. I would like to talk a
li=le bit about the ethical requirements that required in ALL ac+vi+es of AICPA members. The
professor gave us an example. If you were a member of AICPA and you did something wrong
a>er work, you would violate AICPA code of professional conduct. On hearing that, I felt the full-
+me restriction are unacceptable because I do not know why I would be under control even
when I was not conducting accounting services. Then as the course went on, I was aware that
the full-+me requirements do make sense. There are several sensible reasons of these
requirements. Firstly, what members of AICPA sell is trust. Thus, to be trustworthy and reliable,
members of AICPA should .rst be good persons in daily life. It is hard to imagine majority of
people would fully trust a thief or a murder for their accoun+ng services. Secondly, each
member of AICPA can a0ect the reputation of the AICPA. If we were members of AICPA, people
would relate whatever we do to the overall AICPA group. Even the bad things did by one member
in the spare +me would raise public doubts about the professional of the whole AICPA group.
Thirdly, members of AICPA mainly supply public services. Public service concepts rooted in the
ethical behaviors in everyday life. Thus, just as the professor mentioned, to be an eligible
member of AICPA is to do the best you can do, not only on expertise aspect but also on ethical
aspect, not only in working +me but also in spare +me. The .rst step of being an eligible
member of AICPA is to be a good person in daily life.
This week’s one case was about the misconduct of a pharmaceutical company called Johnson &
Johnson; the other case was about the good behavior of a golfer called JP Hayes. These two
cases enlightened me that every person, every company, and every professional area may face
ethical dilemmas. Ethical dilemmas are very common in the real life. So we can learn a lot from
di0erent people with di0erent backgrounds so as to become a more ethical person day by day!
Journal 3
