The role of moral imagination in patients' decision-making

J Med Philos. 2013 Apr;38(2):160-72. doi: 10.1093/jmp/jht006. Epub 2013 Mar 4.

Abstract

This article reviews recent developments within a number of academic disciplines pointing toward an increasing importance of imagination for understanding morality and cognition. Using elements from hermeneutics and metaphor theory, it works toward a framework for a more context-sensitive understanding of human agency, especially focusing on moral deliberation and change. The analytic framework is used to analyze the story of a patient making tough decisions in the context of prenatal diagnosis. We show how a relatively stable outlook on the world, here called the "baseline of choice," is challenged by unexpected events and how imaginative processes enter into the active creation of a new moral order. The ensuing interpretation is then placed within a broader philosophical landscape. John Dewey's notion of "dramatic rehearsal" is put forward as one particularly promising way of understanding moral imagination, deliberation, and decision-making.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Choice Behavior / ethics
  • Decision Making*
  • Ethics, Medical*
  • Humans
  • Imagination*
  • Morals
  • Patient Participation / psychology*
  • Prenatal Diagnosis / ethics
  • Prenatal Diagnosis / psychology