Difference Between Ethical Dilemma & Ethical Distress
When faced with an ethical decision, the process of understanding your choice, making your choice and accepting your choice becomes the ethical process. Within this process you will face two primary barriers to the task of determining an ideal solution and carrying it through to conclusion. The first is the unemotional consideration of an ethical dilemma that occurs prior to the decision-making process, and the other is the ethical distress you feel as you attempt to put your decision into action.
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Ethical Dilemma
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An ethical dilemma occurs when you face a question that involves more than one moral principle, and you have to decide on a course of action based on which principle is more valued. As a classic example, the question of stealing food to survive places you in the position to decide between the value of someone else's property and your own sanctity of life. As an individual, you can determine which value is more important to you, and the study of ethics can help you make this determination.
Ethical Distress
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Ethical distress occurs after you have faced an ethical dilemma and made a choice based on your values. You face the distress as part of the other barriers that block your ability to carry through on your ethical decision. These barriers may include individuals who would physically stop you, laws against your ethical choice or personal relationships that complicate your action. For instance, in the case of stealing to survive, the situation becomes more complicated after you make the decision to steal the food but have to face your own aversion to breaking the law and the penalties that such a crime could incur.
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Emotion
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Ethical dilemmas are most often confronted from an unemotional point of view or a logical perspective. This allows you to look at a situation from a distance, gather the information you need to make your decision and ask the questions that help you clarify your choices. Ethical distress can result from a direct emotional attachment to a situation, a closeness or familiarity to the problem at hand. As an example, consider the abortion debate, which examines the ethical dilemma of individual rights in conflict with sanctity of life issues. Individuals commonly examine this debate from each of these standpoints and determine their own ethical stance on the issue; however, once the issue comes home for them, in the case of a personal pregnancy or the pregnancy of your teenage child, emotional distress is the emotional complication that forces you to confront the choice made during your ethical dilemma.
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Confronting an ethical dilemma occurs prior to the decision making process. It is the cerebral consideration of the situation from a logical perspective. Solving an ethical dilemma does not solve an ethical problem, it only provides you with the understanding of how to solve the issue. Ethical distress is felt after the decision-making process, when you are attempting to act on your ethical principles. The resolution of ethical distress occurs when you have fully addressed an ethical issue and put your decision into action or when you chose to not.
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References
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