Running Head: ETHICAL DECISION MAKING 1
Ethical Decision Making
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ETHICAL DECISION MAKING 2
Ethical Decision Making
Problem Identification
The case provided involves the behavior of John, a drug and alcohol counseling intern, in
response to friend requests from two of their clients. The involvement of the counseling intern in
multiple groups within the counseling facility means that John is familiar with, and to, mots of
the clients. One of the clients, Ben, sends John a friend request on Facebook with the latter
accepting the request. The basis of accepting the private friend request is pegged on John’s
cordial interactions with Ben. In accepting the friend request, John engages in a dual relationship
pitting a counselor and their client. However, the establishment and sustenance of dual
relationships are not ethical, as depicted in the ethical codes of the American Counseling
Association. Ultimately, John fails to safeguard the professional counselor and client relationship
by accepting Ben’s friend request on his private Facebook account.
Still, John is also portrayed as having rejected a similar private friend request from
Jeanne, a female client under the excuse of John not accepting a friend request from females.
However, the actual reason is that Jeanne is an argumentative client, and they do not usually get
along with John. The unethical behavior exhibited by John provides a potential strain on their
relationship and thus impairing John’s ability to provide proper consoling to Jeanne. In turn, the
biased treatment of Jeanne presents a potential problem if she ends out that John accepted Ben’s
request. In exhibiting preferential treatment towards Ben, John acted unethically by failing to
uphold the value of justice. John should not have accepted Ben’s friend request on his private
Facebook account to discourage the establishment of dual relationships. Even though he was
right in rejecting Jeanne’s friend request, the justification for rejecting the request is unethical.
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Applicable Codes of Ethics
John’s behavior violates the ACA code of ethics through an impairment of the integrity
of the client-counselor relationship. In particular, section A.4.a of the guideline stipulates that
counselors have an intricate duty of safeguarding the welfare of the clients. In addition, the
guidelines assert that counselors should only take decisions that promote the growth and
development of the client while minimizing the risk of unavoidable harm (ACA, 2014). While
the code of ethics prohibit John, and other counselors, from accepting personal and private
relationship request from their clients, the damage has already been done. Inherently, therefore,
John should seek to minimize the risk of harm to the client in consistency with the provision of
the code of ethics. Section A.5.c of the code of ethics also prohibits counselors from engaging in
virtual relationships with active clients to reduce the potential for bias and undermining of
client’s welfare.
Even though the code of ethics permits limited boundary extensions in Section A.6.b, it is
only allowed in special instance, such as visiting a client’s’ ill relatives. John’s behavior
undermines the integrity of their relationship with the client because it was achieved through
their personal accounts. In section H.6.a of the code of ethics, counselors are permitted to initiate
relationships with clients through professional social platforms that are separate from their
private pages (ACA, 2014). However, there is a limitation in the use of such pages through
section H.6.b which requires full disclosure of the benefits and boundaries of use to the client.
The counseling intern failed to make these disclosures, thereby violating the provision of the
code of ethics. In the end, John’s behavior of establishing dual relationships with clients is
unethical, even though it did not cause harm to Ben and Jeanne.
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Dimensions of the Dilemma
The actions of the counseling intern can be analyzed through the five ethical principles as
developed in Forester-Miller and Davis (1996). In particular, the principles of ethical behavior
include consideration of autonomy, beneficence, fidelity, nonmaleficence, and justice (Cooney &
Quinlan-Colwell, 2020). Although all the principles are equal in weight, a counselor has the
opportunity to prioritizing them based on the specific circumstances of the case. In the case
provided, John should prioritize the principle of nonmaleficence, which is based on the
imposition of no harm to clients. Through a consideration of the principle of nonmaleficence,
John has the opportunity of making more informed decisions on the friend requests. Besides, the
desire to inflict no harm on the clients would guide John in limiting the exposure of harm to the
clients even after accepting their friend requests. In essence, the counseling intern engaged in an
action that had the potential of inflicting harm on the client.
Besides the principle of nonmaleficence, beneficence is also relevant in analyzing the
conduct of the counselor. According to Forester-Miller and Davis (1996), maleficence entails the
promotion of the client’s positive welfare by the counselor through prevention of harm and doing
good. Based on this principle of ethics, John should have rejected Ben’s friend request and
prevented them from potential harm. Indeed, the maintenance of objectivity of a counselor is
dependent on strict adherence to the ACA code of ethics and particularly the prohibition of
virtual relationships. Still, the counseling intern violated the principle of beneficence through the
mistreatment of their clients. The decision to accept or reject the client’s Facebook friend
requests was based on his feelings towards the clients and not professionalism. By accepting one
friend request and rejecting the other, the intern counselor failed to uphold the ethical principle
of justice. Indeed, the bias expressed in the preferential treatment of John was based on their
ETHICAL DECISION MAKING 5
cordial relationships in groups. A consideration of the principle of beneficence would have
helped to equalize the situation.
Still, the principle of justice also takes precedence in this case based on the need for fair
treatment of clients. According to Remley and Herlihy (2014), justice is not limited to the
treatment of individuals in equal terms. Instead, justice entails equal treatment of equals and
proportional unequal treatment of unequal based on the relevant differences. In this regard,
counselors should provide relevant justifications of their unequal treatment of clients (Arthur,
2019). In this case, John did not provide a justifiable reason for the preferential treatment of Ben
over Jeanne and instead excused the treatment through gender. By failing to consider the ethical
principle of justice, John exposes his clients to harm through the knowledge of preferential
treatment of some clients. John should have consulted his supervisors in making the decisions on
friend requests considering that he was a relatively new practitioner. Besides, the local ACA
chapter would have been handy in offering professional advice on the handling of virtual
relationships with active clients.
Probable Courses of Action
The most appropriate course of action would have been to use the firm’s informed
consent policy in guiding the decisions. However, the action has already been taken and cannot
be reversed, thereby warranting new potential courses of action. One of the proposed action is to
deactivate the Facebook account that was involved and create a new professional account for
adding clients. Similarly, John has the option of deleting Ben from his current Facebook
account’s fervid list and meeting them to explain the situation. Though the explanation, John will
impart little harm on Ben because of the admission of his mistake in accepting the request
ETHICAL DECISION MAKING 6
initially. Still, John can meet with Jeanne and explain to her that the professional code of ethics
does not permit them to be friends. This course of action can also be attained through the
creation of a professional account and sending a request to Jeanne in the new account.
Consequences of the Proposed Courses of Action
The action of going to Ben and admitting his mistake in accepting the request poses the
potential of inflicting harm on the client. Indeed, the client, Ben, might not be very pleased with
the decision of recanting the acceptance, thereby straining the client-counselor relationship
between them. Similarly, telling Jeanne of the true reasons for not accepting her friend request
would impair potential harm to their relationship. The other course of action involves the closure
of the private Facebook account and the creation of a professional page. This action would allow
the counselor to accept a friend request from all clients based on the firm’s policy. Based on the
available options, I would combine the closure of the Facebook account and the creation of a
page with the decision to admit his mistakes to both Ben and Jeanne. John should, therefore seek
a meeting with Jeanne and Ben and explain the restriction on dual relationships in the code of
ethics and then offer to add them on his professional Facebook page.
Evaluation of Selected Course of Action
The choice of action is based on the need to protect the clients from harm wheel
exercising professionalism in the handling of friend requests (Bratt, 2010). Indeed, the selected
course of action is consistent with the code of ethics that prohibit virtual relationships, unless it is
achieved through a professional social page. Even though the course of action has the potential
of causing harm to Ben and Jeanne by hurting their feelings, the concept of justice is significant
in affirming these decisions. Besides, the action promotes honesty in the management of
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mistakes and errors in professional practice. Still, the action passes the test of publicity and
universality as it is based on the correction of mistakes done in the past. In particular, the honesty
of admitting one’s mistakes upholds the tests of universality as the best approach.
Implementation of Course of Action
The implementation of the selected course of action begins with a meeting with my
supervisor to explain the situation and the intended course of action. Then, I would schedule a
physical meeting of both Jeanne and Ben individually. In these meetings, an honest explanation
of the intended course of action, coupled with an admission of mistakes, would be helpful. I
would then offer an apology to both Ben and Jeanne for my unethical behavior. Following the
apology, I would then seek informed consent from both Ben and Jeanne before sending them a
friend request from the newly created professional page. Later, I would use the group meetings
to tell every client that I have a professional page and that they were welcome to send friend
requests for communications outside the facility.
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References
American Counseling Association. (2014). 2014 ACA Code of Ethics.
http://www.counseling.org
Arthur, N. (2019). Counselling in cultural contexts: Identities and social justice. Springer.
Bratt, W. (2010). Ethical Considerations of Social Networking for Counsellors. Canadian
Journal of Counselling and Psychotherapy, 44(4), 335-345.
Cooney, M., & Quinlan-Colwell, A. (2020). Assessment and multimodal management of pain -
E-book: An integrative approach. Elsevier Health Sciences.
Forester-Miller, H., & Davis, T. E. (1996). A practitioner's guide to ethical decision making.
Alexandria, VA: American Counseling Association.
Remley, T. P., & Herlihy, B. (2014). Ethical, legal, and professional issues in counseling (p.,
528). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson.
