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WORKING PAPER
Increasing the Moral Imagination of Children through Literature:
The Key to Future Ethical Leadership?
David Boulger
[email protected]
Manchester Metropolitan University
UFHRD 2015
CORK
3rd – 5th June 2015
1
ABSTRACT
Purpose
This working paper summarises a pilot study completed within a Masters Degree in
Leadership undertaken at Manchester Metropolitan University.
The purpose was to synergise the potential implications of existing research into moral
imagination, child development and the use of fiction as a means of enhancing
leadership ethics.
Design / Methodology / Approach
The pilot study was approached from a relativist ontological perspective, and a social
constructionist epistemological paradigm.
The primary methodological approach was qualitative, complemented by a quantitative
methodology to add value to the empirical evidence base as part of a mixed
methodology.
Findings
The ‘moral imagination’ of young people can be increased through the use of fictional
literature.
2
Research limitations / implications
This research was small in scale and limited in scope; The methodology was previously
untested; The research provides a platform for a more extensive longitudinal study.
Practical implications
This limited pilot study has created a platform for a more in depth, longitudinal research
study to explore the potential of this approach to increase the impact of leadership
education in relation to ethics.
Social implications
If confirmed, the findings have implications for the role that educators within the
Primary, Secondary, Further and Higher Education sectors in the UK have in equipping
children and young adults with moral imagination as a key leadership attribute.
Originality / Value
The research synthesizes a range of research topics in the context of leadership ethics.
The methodology utilized was unique.
The findings contribute to an under-developed evidence base that has significant
implications in the context of educating future leaders.
3
Keywords
Moral Imagination; Ethics; Leadership; Fiction; Children
Word Count
4878 (Excluding bibliography)
4
“…children learn a morality of flesh and bone and not one of vague principles”
(Kazamek, 1986, p.271)
5
INTRODUCTION
There is increasing interest in the concept of ‘leadership ethics’ (Kennedy, 1992; Brown
and Trevino, 2006).
Recent high profile scandals have placed ethics at the forefront of leadership education
(Knights and O’Leary, 2006), requiring leaders to re-evaluate existing approaches and
paradigms in an ever changing world (Monahan, 2012).
There is increasing evidence of the sustained competitive advantage that can be
achieved by ethical organizations, and limitations of those organizations lacking a clear
sense of business ethics (Collins, 2009; Desjardins, 2009; Petrick and Quinn, 2001).
On a macro level, business leaders are expected to display greater responsibility in
ensuring that their actions contribute to stability, strength and harmony in society
(Mendonca and Kunango, 2007; Holden, 2000).
On a micro level, there is an increasing body of evidence highlighting the critical role
that ethics play in leader-follower relationships, individual and organisational decisionmaking, and commitment to personal and organisational goals (Ciulla, 1995 and 2004;
Kouzes and Posner, 2002).
However, leadership ‘educators’ have reflected upon a perceived failure of traditional
business education approaches to equip leaders with a sound grasp of morality and
ethics. (Goshal, 2005; Mintzberg, 2004; Derry and Green, 1989).
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There are a number of methods utilised in ‘teaching’ leadership ethics (Morris and
Wood, 2011), and one such method involves the use of fictional literature as a vehicle
for enabling leaders to explore ethics (Baldaracco, 2006). There is evidence that this
approach has merit.
However, one criticism of this approach is that it fails to maximize the potential to
internalize morality and ethics within leaders.
Young and Annisette (2009) argue that literature can enable leaders to build their
‘unfinished self’ and to enhance their ‘moral imagination’ which will ensure that ethical
leadership reflects not just what they do, but who they are.
Moral Imagination, defined as “the ability to discern the aspects embedded within a
situation and develop a range of alternative solutions to the situation from a moral
perspective” (Godwin, 2012, p.5), forms a key element underpinning ethical leadership.
This research argued that greater emphasis should be placed upon utilizing literature to
build the ‘moral imagination’ of children and young people through building upon their
‘unfinished self and equipping them to be future ethical leaders.
LITERATURE REVIEW
This is a summary of an extensive literature review undertaken as part of this research.
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Using Fiction to ‘Teach’ Ethics
In his seminal 1989 text, “The Call of Stories”, Coles contended that fiction plays a
critical role in introducing, enhancing and developing morality and ethics to those in
positions of leadership.
Baldaracco (2006) argued that fictional literature offers a personal and internal view of
leadership:
“It opens the door to a world rarely seen…it let’s us watch leaders as they think, worry,
hope, hesitate, commit, exult, regret and reflect. We see their characters tested,
reshaped, strengthened, or weakened. These books draw us into leaders’ worlds, put
us in their shoes, and at times let us share their experience”
(Baldaracco, 2006, p3)
Kennedy and Lawton (1992) argued that conventional approaches to teaching
leadership ethics were ill-equipped for exploring the complex moral issues that
contemporary leaders are required to navigate, whereas fictional narrative enables a
much deeper exploration of these issues and encourages a greater level of involvement
and reflection amongst leaders.
Ciulla (1997) views critical thinking as a key feature of ethical leadership as it enables
leaders to develop imagination and vision, and argues that such skills are a fundamental
leadership competency and that stories and literature are a vital tool in developing this
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skill. All of this is geared towards developing ethical leaders who are able to both “lead
by the head” and “lead by the heart” (Cuilla, 1997, p111).
Ciulla (2004) further expands upon these ideas by arguing that ‘moral imagination’ is
the vehicle by which ethical leaders visualize ethics and turn them into action, and that
fiction is a method for enabling leaders to develop this ethical skill set.
Shaw (1992) argues that fiction provides a richer medium through which to explore
ethical leadership issues and serves as an enabler for ‘imaginative sympathy’ allowing
leaders to put themselves in the shoes of those involved and explore ethical and moral
issues from a range of viewpoints that they would otherwise not be able to access.
Young and Annisette (2009) strongly advocate the use of literature in developing an
understanding of ethics and, as identified in the introduction to this paper, they argue
that literature can enable leaders to build their ‘unfinished self’ and their ‘moral
imagination’, which will ensure that ethical leadership is not just what they do, but is
who they are.
This research was developed around this observation.
Whilst the full iterature review largely indicated that Fiction offered a significant
contribution to the understanding of leadership ethics and the enhancement of moral
imagination, it is also important to consider the criticisms of this approach.
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LeBaron (2009) identified 3 key criticisms of the use of literature in enhancing
leadership ethics:
1. The choice of fiction, and the way in which it is used is highly subjective and
this can have significant consequences in terms of advocating a particular
viewpoint of the world, and in terms of promoting some voices and silencing
others.
2. The approach lacks any meaningful empirical evidence base.
3. Too much value is put upon the importance of fiction, and the assumption that
characters in books reflect real lives and life-like behaviours is flawed.
These points have links to a wider body of critical research (Mihelic et al, 2010;
Brown and Trevino, 2006; Bartlett, 2003) which provide a damning indictment of the
current evidence base which argues that the literature around leadership ethics is
fragmented, in disarray, full of controversy, based upon diverse and independent
research streams, theoretically formless and empirically weak.
It is possible to hypothesize from this position, that whilst the use of fiction appears to
be intuitively appropriate, it might be based upon a flawed theoretical platform.
Fiction as a tool for developing Ethics in Children and Young People
10
There is existing research into the use of children’s literature in exploring ethical
leadership issues including Harry Potter (Rosser, 2007), Doctor Seuss (Greenwood,
2000; Comer and Holbrook, 2005) and the Hunger Games (Strom, 2012).
However, this relates to the use of children’s literature with adults.
Kazamek (1986) contends that using children’s literature as a form of moral education
with children allows them to apply theory to practice as “children learn a morality of
flesh and bone and not one of vague principles” (Kazamek, 1986, p.271).
This perspective has synergies with the observations of Young and Annisette (2009)
about it being critical that leadership ethics are internalized within those in positions of
leadership, not just conceptually understood by them.
Bennett (1993) provides examples of children’s stories that are considered appropriate
for exposing moral dilemmas through literature, as do Field and Weiss (1987), but
neither link it to leadership ethics.
Naylor (2010) argues that reading children’s literature during childhood can play a
significant role in self-construction and presentation of self as a leader in adulthood.
At present, however, there is a paucity of research looking specifically at the use of
literature with children as a means of developing more ethical future leaders.
Moral Imagination
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Moral imagination is seen as an enabler of ethical decision-making, which is
increasingly being seen as a key feature of sustained competitive advantage in
contemporary society (Johnson, 1993a and 1993b; Moberg and Seabright, 2000;
Werhane, 1998 and 1999, Godwin, 2012).
Moral Imagination is not a new concept, but there is no consensus definition. (Werhane,
1999).
After reviewing numerous definitions, a common theme emerged of Moral Imagination
as a dual process that involves the ability to identify the range of options that present
themselves in a given situation, and to select the option that is most morally and
ethically sound.
For the purposes of this research the definition used was from Godwin (2012) who
defined Moral Imagination as “the ability to discern the aspects embedded within a
situation and develop a range of alternative solutions to the situation from a moral
perspective” (Godwin, 2012, p.5).
Godwin elaborates that Moral Imagination involves two distinct, but inter-dependent
processes:
1. Discerning – Identifying the range of moral issues that are present in a situation.
2. Developing – Formulating a range of alternative solutions from a moral
perspective
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An individual must be able to demonstrate both processes to be consider morally
imaginative.
Identifying Synergies
Overall, there is a significant body of research exploring the value of using fictional
literature as a vehicle for enhancing understanding of leadership ethics.
There is also some limited research seeking to use children’s literature, but not with
children.
There will also undoubtedly be some research around the moral education of children
from an educational psychology perspective, but not linked to leadership education.
This literature review did not identify any research exploring the synergies between
these areas.
As such, this research could add significant value to the evidence base around the core
concepts of:

Leadership Ethics

Moral Imagination

Child Development
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The research specifically sought to identify the synergies between these concepts in a
way that is not prominent within the current evidence base and utilized fictional
literature as the synergizing medium:
Figure 1: Research Focus Diagram
Leadership
Ethics
Research
Focus
Value of
Fictional
Literature
Moral
Imagination
Child
Development
METHODOLOGY
Ontology
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There is no consensus definition of ‘leadership ethics’, but contemporary research
largely views leadership ethics, and associated concepts such as ‘moral imagination’,
as social constructs (Brown and Trevino, 2005 and 2006).
Given this starting point, the ontological perspective underpinning this research was
from the ‘relativist’ school of thought.
Epistemology
The epistemological paradigm of inquiry was one centred around Social
Constructionism and the viewpoint that reality is determined by people rather than by
objective and external factors.
As such, the primary role of the research was not to gather facts or measure patterns,
but to explore the meanings that people assigned to their experiences, and to identify
whether the use of literature could change participant attitude and perception.
Methodology
Research within a ‘relativist’ and ‘social constructionist’ paradigm often lends itself to
qualitative research methodology. However, in order to add value to the empirical
evidence base, this research also incorporated an element of quantitative research.
Method
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Delivering the above methodology, within the identified ontological and
epistemological paradigm required a number of methods:

An initial semi-structured interview with each participant;

Coding and Scoring of the Interview responses;

A series of group workshops with all participants to explore the moral issues
within a number of selected pieces of literature;

Narrative Content Analysis of the workshops;

A follow-up semi-structured interview with each participant;

Coding and Scoring of the Interview responses;

Comparison between the Initial Interview results and the Final Interview results.
Identifying a Unit of Measurement
There is no consensus view on what is meant by the term ‘leadership ethics’, which
creates a challenge when undertaking quantitative research.
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Research in relation to measuring leadership ethics is fragmented and there is no
definitive framework (Yukl et al, 2011).
Conversely, there is also a lack of an agreed measure of unethical behaviour (Kaptein,
2008).
This posed a significant methodological challenge, which may explain the empirically
weak existing evidence base.
It is within this context that focus shifted to measuring an independent variable of
leadership ethics – Moral Imagination.
Measuring ‘Moral Imagination’
The definition of Moral Imagination that was utilized in this research was:
“The ability to discern the aspects embedded within a situation and develop a range of
alternative solutions to the situation from a moral perspective”
(Godwin, 2012, p.5)
Moral Imagination has also proved challenging to measure (Yurtsever, 2006).
This research built upon the approach of Godwin (2012) who measured Moral
Imagination using vignettes, a coded likert scale, and a coding rubric
17
This approach was incorporated into a semi-structured interview, allowing it to be
complemented by more qualitative information, which was explored using ‘content
analysis’.
Unlike Godwin, whose work focussed upon adults and took a snapshot in time, this
research selected new vignettes which were more relevant to a younger cohort, and
utilised two sets of vignettes – one at the initial interview and one at a follow up
interview.
The Semi-Structured Interviews
On an individual basis, participants were asked to read two vignettes, each of which
contained a practical dilemma with a moral dimension.
They were then asked to imagine they were actually in that situation and answer 4
questions:
1. List as many ways as you can think of to take action in this situation;
2. List the underlying issues that are important to consider when deciding on which
of the above actions to take in this situation;
3. Indicate which action you would take and why;
4. List who you think will be impacted upon by your decision and why.
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This applied to both the initial interview and the final interview.
Coding the Moral Imagination Measure
Vignette-based measures result in open-ended responses, which allow for the capture
of qualitative information.
However, for this research to add to the empirical evidence base, it was necessary to
transform this evidence into quantitative data.
To achieve this, the response to each question against each vignette was rated on a 4point Likert Scale across the ‘discerning’ and ‘developing’ dimensions, and the scores
were then entered into a coding rubric, and analysed at an individual and cohort level.
An example of the coding rubric is as follows:
Figure 2: Moral Imagination Coding Rubic
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72
DEVELOPING
Fluency
Impact
Awareness
DISCERNING
Issues
Awareness
Moral Imagination
Component
Score
Vignette 1
Average
Sub Score
Vignette 2
Total Score Calculations
3+1/2=
Add total points in this category for each
vignette and divide by 2 for overall
“Discerning” Score
2
3
1
Vignette 1
Vignette 2
2
2
2+2/2=
Total
vignette 1
Total
vignette 2
Overall
Discerning
Avg
5
3
(5+3)/2=
4
2
Vignette 1
Vignette 2
3
3
3+3/2=
3
Vignette 1
Add total points in this category for each
vignette and divide by 2 for overall
“Developing” Score
Vignette 2
2+2/2=
2
Flexibility
2
2
Total
vignette 1
Total
vignette 2
5
5
Overall
Developing
Avg
(5+5)/2=
5
Table 2:Godwin
Moral Imagination
(Source:
(2012)) Scoring Calculation Ex ample
Descriptive statistics for participants’ results on the discerning and developing
dimensions of moral imagination are found in Table 3, as well as the descriptive statistics
“Discerning” required coding in relation to Issue Awareness and Impact Awareness.
for the four sub-dimensions along which these two skills were coded.
Issue Awareness related to how much the respondent was aware of the moral issues in
a situation, and Impact Awareness related to how much they were aware of who else
would be affected by their actions.
The responses provided by Questions 2 and 4 were used to assess this.
“Developing” required coding in relation to Fluency and Flexibility. Fluency referred
to the volume of ideas generated and Flexibility related to the amount of different
categories of ideas that were generated.
The responses to Question 1 were used to assess this.
Calculating the Moral imagination Scores
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Scores were allocated in relation to ‘discerning’, ‘developing’ and ‘overall moral
imagination’ using the coding matrix described in 3.9.
To calculate the discerning score, the total scores for Issue Awareness and Impact
Awareness for vignette 1 and vignette 2 where added together and then divided by 2:
Discerning Score = (Impact Awareness Score for Vignette 1 + Impact Awareness
Score for Vignette 2 + Issue Awareness Score for Vignette 1 + Issue Awareness Score
for Vignette 2) / 2
The mean average scores for the two underlying factors, Issue Awareness and Impact
Awareness, were also calculated using the following formulas.
Mean Average Issue Awareness Score = (Issue Awareness Vignette 1 + Issue
Awareness Vignette 2) / 2
Mean Average Impact Awareness Score = (Impact Awareness Vignette 1 + Impact
Awareness Vignette 2) / 2
To calculate the developing score, a similar process was applied but utilising the
Fluency and Flexibility scores as follows:
Developing Score = (Fluency Vignette 1 + Fluency Vignette 2 + Flexibility Vignette 1
+ Flexibility Vignette 2) / 2
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Mean Average Fluency Score = (Fluency Vignette 1 + Fluency Vignette 2) / 2
Mean Average Flexibility Score = (Flexibility Vignette 1 + Flexibility Vignette 2) / 2
To be deemed Morally Imaginative, a participant had to score highly for both
‘developing’ and ‘discerning’.
A high score was deemed to be an average score of 4 or over as this indicated that the
responses had coded consistently in the top half of the possible responses on the coding
matrix.
A low score was indicated by a score of less than 4 as this indicated that the responses
had been consistently coded in the bottom half of the possible responses in the coding
matrix.
Workshops
Group workshops provided the vehicle to deliver the practical intervention to influence
Moral Imagination through the use of literature.
The following literature was utilised:

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins (2008)

The Hobbit by JRR Tolkien (1937)
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
The Lorax by Dr Seuss (1971)
This literature was chosen doe to the moral issues presented and their attractiveness to
the cohort.
The workshops were structured to explore a series of self-reflective questions posed by
Baldaracco (2006):
1. Do I have a good dream?
2. How flexible is my moral code?
3. Are my role models unsettling?
4. Do I really care?
5. Am I ready to take responsibility?
6. Can I resist the flow of success?
7. How well do I combine principles and pragmatism?
8. What is sound reflection?
To ensure research and ethical integrity, a qualified teacher worked as a co-researcher
to undertake the interviews, workshops, and coding alongside the researcher
The Research Cohort
The sample cohort was seven young women aged 16-18 who had self-identified as
future leaders.
23
ANALYSIS OF THE DATA
Initial Assessment
The initial assessment was undertaken through a semi-structured interview with
individual research participants.
The responses were coded, individual scores were then collated, and a mean average
score for the entire cohort was calculated. The mean average scores awarded in relation
to the two vignettes were as follows:
Figure 3: Cumulative Initial Assessment Results
Moral
Imagination
Component
V1
Total
V1
Average
V2
Total
V2
Average
Discerning
Issue Awareness
Impact Awareness
15
11
2.14
1.57
12
6
1.71
0.86
Developing
Fluency
Flexibility
13
12
1.85
1.71
18
13
2.57
1.85
Total Scores
51
7.29
49
7
Average Discerning
Score
3.14
Average Developing
Score
3.99
From the cohort of 7 individuals, only 1 scored highly for both discerning and
developing, thus making them morally imaginative.
24
This was comparable to Godwin’s research where 10.9% of her cohort was assessed as
being morally imaginative.
Figure 4: Initial Assessment Results by Individual Participant
Initial Assessment Results by Participant
6
Score
5
4
3
2
1
0
P1
P2
P3
P4
P5
P6
P7
Initial Discerning Score
2.5
2.5
2
4.5
3.5
3.5
3.5
Initial Developing Score
2
4
4
4.5
4.5
5.5
3.5
Only 1 individual (P4) scored highly within the ‘discerning’ category with 6 of the
cohort unable to adequately discern the moral aspects within the vignettes.
The cohort had particularly low scores for Impact Awareness implying that they were
unable to identify who was affected by the actions and how they were affected.
Issue Awareness was also subject to a low overall score implying that the participants
were unable to identify the moral issues that were present in the scenarios.
This compared to 5 of the 7 members of the cohort who scored highly for ‘developing’
indicating that the majority of the group could identify a range of options and displayed
high levels of fluency and flexibility.
25
This implies that whilst the cohort was able to identify a range of options in relation to
a given situation, they were unable to identify the moral issues or fully understand the
likely impact of the different options available.
Workshop Narrative Observations
Following the Initial Interviews, the cohort took part in four workshops and the
following are summary observation of extensive records that were taken.
Workshop One used Chapters 14 and 25 of The Hunger Games to explore:
-
How flexible is my moral code?
-
How well do I combine principles and pragmatism?
As was the case in the initial assessment, the group were able to generate a large number
of options to presenting dilemmas, thus showing high levels of fluency.
The group showed levels of flexibility that were in excess of the initial assessment and
identified options that were wide-ranging in nature, perhaps reflecting the added value
of approaching the problem as a group rather than as an individual.
The discussion relating to Issue Awareness was congruent with the initial assessment
as the group struggled to identify the moral issues that were present in the situation.
26
In relation to Impact Awareness, the group were able to identify most of the key
affected parties, but struggled to articulate the nature and extent of any impact.
These observations reinforced the findings of the initial assessment as the group overall
displayed reasonable Developing attributes, but poor Discerning attributes.
Workshop Two used The Hunger Games to explore:
-
Are my role models unsettling?
The group agreed that role models were important and enabled aspiration and guidance.
However, the group could not identify any positive role models other than their teacher
and family members, and it was the observation of the researchers that this reinforced
the value of fictional literature in providing a ‘moral compass’ for young people.
Workshop Three used The Lorax to explore:
-
Do I have a good dream?
-
Can I resist the flow of success?
Once again, the group displayed high levels of fluency and a reasonable level of
flexibility.
However, they again displayed limitations in relation to Impact and Issue Awareness.
27
However, unlike previous sessions, when prompted by the researcher they did begin to
display some ‘discerning’ skills in a way that had not been evidenced before, and with
support from the researchers the participants displayed improved levels of impact
awareness and issue awareness.
Workshop Four used The Hobbit to explore:
-
How flexible is my moral code?
-
How well do I combine principles and pragmatism?
The group again showed good levels of fluency and flexibility.
The group also began to show a greater degree of insight into the discerning attributes
with Impact Awareness and Issue Awareness, identified as a significant weakness in
the Initial Assessment, appearing to be improving within the cohort.
Workshops Content Analysis
The researchers summary analysis of whether the group showed evidence of
competence in relation to the 4 components of Moral Imagination was as follows:
Figure 5: Overview of Workshop Observations
Issue
Awareness
Workshop 1
Workshop 2
Workshop 3
Workshop 4
No
Partial
Partial
Partial
(with help)
(with help)
28
Impact
Partial
No
Partial
Partial
Awareness
(with help)
Fluency
Yes
Partial
Yes
Yes
Flexibility
Yes
Partial
Yes
Yes
(with help)
These observations indicated clear positive changes over time.
Final Assessment
The final assessment replicated the method of the initial assessment, but utilized two
new vignettes.
The mean average scores awarded in relation to the two vignettes were as follows:
Figure 6: Cumulative Final Assessment Results
Moral
Imagination
V1
V1
Component
Total
Average Total
29
V2
V2
Average
Discerning
Developing
Issue Awareness
14
2
13
1.86
Impact Awareness
12
1.71
13
1.86
Fluency
16
2.29
16
2.29
Flexibility
14
2
12
1.71
Total Scores
56
8
54
7.71
Average Discerning
Score
3.72
Average Developing
Score
4.15
These results indicate a small improvement in relation to Issue Awareness amongst the
participants, and a significant improvement in relation to Impact Awareness. This led
to an overall increase in Discerning Skills.
The results for Fluency and Flexibility remained relatively static, leading to only a very
small increase in Developing Skills, albeit moving the overall group average ahead of
the 4 ‘threshold’ which was seen as being indicative of possessing and applying the
‘developing’ attributes.
In terms of individual participants, the most significant area of change was that 3 (P4,
P5 and P6) of the 7 participants could now be considered to be morally imaginative.
30
Figure 7: Final Assessment Results by Individual Participant
Final Assessment Results by Participant
6
5
Score
4
3
2
1
0
P1
P2
P3
P4
P5
P6
P7
Final Discerning Score
3
3.5
3
Final Developing Score
3
4
4
4.5
4
4.5
3.5
4.5
4.5
5
4
In relation to discerning, all 7 participants either improved or remained static.
Figure 8: Overview of Discerning Scores by Individual Participant
Discerning Score
Individual Participant Discerning Scores
5
4.5
4
3.5
3
2.5
2
1.5
1
0.5
0
P1
P2
P3
P4
P5
P6
P7
Initial Discerning Score
2.5
2.5
2
4.5
3.5
3.5
3.5
Final Discerning Score
3
3.5
3
4.5
4
4.5
3.5
In relation to developing scores, 6 of the 7 candidates improved or remained static, with
one candidate expiring a slight reduction, albeit from a very high initial score, and
remaining within the Morally Imaginative cohort.
Figure 9: Overview of Developing Scores by Individual Participant
31
Individual Participant Developing Scores
6
5
Score
4
3
2
1
0
P1
P2
P3
P4
P5
P6
P7
Initial Developing Score
2
4
4
4.5
4.5
5.5
3.5
Final Developing Score
3
4
4
4.5
4.5
5
4
All of this culminated in an overall increase in both Developing and Discerning.
Figure 10: Overview of Overall Cohort Changes to Discerning and Developing
Overall Changes to Discerning and Developing Scores
4.5
4
3.5
Scores
3
2.5
Discerning Score
2
Developing Score
1.5
1
0.5
0
Initial
Final
These findings support the hypothesis that fictional literature can increase the Moral
Imagination of young people, and has a particularly significant impact on the
‘discerning’ attributes of Issue Awareness and Impact Awareness.
DISCUSSION OF FINDINGS
32
Research Limitations
In many ways, it is the limitations of this study that are of greatest value as this was
intended to be a pilot study to steer the development of a more wide ranging
longitudinal research study.
The fundamental limitation of this research is that it rather unrealistically aims to link
a number of key areas of research which have been explored in silos to date, namely:

Can literature enhance leadership ethics?

Are there links between high moral imagination and sound ethical leadership?

What is the best way to develop moral imagination in children and young
people?

What is the best way to measure future ethical leaders?

How can we measure moral imagination and ethical leadership?

Can this impact upon future ethical leadership practices?
This is with an ultimate aim of creating a synthesised piece of research in relation to
the moral development of children, the use of literature in developing leadership ethics,
and the potential to combine the two to create more ethical future leaders.
The size and make up of the cohort is another limitation. A group of 7 young women
is neither sufficient, nor representative, in terms of drawing out more robust
conclusions.
33
The methodology utilized within this research is a further limitation. Due to the lack
of a credible alternative, the researcher was required to develop new means of
measuring Moral Imagination. Whilst it was grounded some existing practices, and
rooted in the work of Godwin (2012), this measurement tool, and it’s application within
the context of a semi-structured interview, the vignettes and the workshops were unique
and have not been subject to replication to test reliability or bias.
Key Findings
Firstly, the research echoed the findings of Godwin who found that only a small
proportion of people possess Moral Imagination.
Secondly, the research provided evidence of an improvement in Moral Imagination,
thus indicating that it can be influenced and enhanced, and is not a ‘fixed’ attribute.
Thirdly, whilst it was the time and space afforded for moral dialogue that was vital, it
was the use of literature that served to provide structure, richness and context.
Finally, this research provided some evidence that it is possible to build an empirical
evidence base about social constructs such as ‘ethics’ and ‘moral imagination’.
Overall, whilst being cognisant of the wider context to this research and the linkages it
has to leadership ethics, it is worth referring back to the core research question –
34
Can literature enhance the Moral Imagination of children and young people?
Even with the limitations that existed, this research would indicate that the answer to
this question is ‘yes’.
Opportunities for Further Research
This pilot study reinforced a hypothesis that increasing their moral imagination, through
the use of fictional literature, whilst they are children and young adults could positively
influence the ethics of future leaders.
Future expansion of this research could provide an opportunity to develop an evidence
base which shapes future policy and practice to ensure that future generations of leaders
are equipped with an innate propensity to apply moral imagination and make decisions
that are ethical and of mutual benefit key stakeholders.
CONCLUSIONS
The development of Moral Imagination is a critical issue as it goes to the core of how
leadership education, talent management and workforce development could, and
possibly should, be shaped in future years.
Unless the dearth of Moral Imagination is addressed there is an inherent risk that future
leaders will lack the ability to make ethically sound and mutually beneficial decisions,
35
which will have a detrimental impact on wider society, whilst also adversely impacting
the long-term effectiveness, competitiveness and profitability of their organisations.
As we witness evidence of the role that literature can play in enhancing moral
imagination and ethical awareness, the role of ethics education through fiction gains
increasing prominence as a means of addressing this skills shortage.
As we continue to see the children of today as the leaders of the future, the importance
of them developing moral imagination through literature and education becomes
essential.
36
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