The Center for the Study of Ethics and Human Values has awarded research grants for six faculty projects and four student projects for 2007-08.
“These recipients were chosen from a compelling field of entries and represent graduate, undergraduate and professional students as well as faculty from five divisions and 11 departments within the University,” said Walt O. Schalick III, M.D., Ph.D., the center’s associate director and senior fellow for research and assistant professor of history in Arts & Sciences and of pediatrics.
Faculty grant winners are Robert W. Sussman, Ph.D., professor of anthropology in Arts & Sciences, and C. Robert Cloninger, M.D., the Wallace Renard Professor of Psychiatry, for a project on the origins of altruism; Corinna A. Treitel, Ph.D., assistant professor of history, Rafia M. Zafar, Ph.D., professor of English and of African & African American Studies, and Glenn D. Stone, Ph.D., professor of anthropology, all in Arts & Sciences, for a program on the ethics of diet;
Carl F. Craver, Ph.D., assistant professor of philosophy in Arts & Sciences, for a study of episodic memory and moral agency; Sarah E. Rivett, assistant professor of English, and Stephanie L. Kirk, Ph.D., assistant professor of Romance languages and literatures in Arts & Sciences, for a series on religious transformations of culture; Ann Margaret Baxley, Ph.D., assistant professor of philosophy, for a project on contemporary Kantianism; and L. Lewis Wall, M.D., D.Phil, professor of obstetrics and gynecology, for a study of the ethics of the gynecological surgery pioneered by J. Marion Sims.
The faculty received as much as $5,000 for each project.
Student grant winners include Ryan Black, a graduate student in political science in Arts & Sciences, for a study of the social effects of the Supreme Court’s agenda-setting process; Venu Reddy, a senior in engineering, for research on the ethics of South Indian reproductive policies; Larry Morton, a graduate student in social work, for an investigation of the integration of homeless people with developmental disabilities; and Gregory Gandenberger, a graduate student in philosophy, for research on the nature of experimental truth in the science of Joseph Erlanger and William Gasser.
The students received as much as $2,500 for each project.
The Center for the Study of Ethics and Human Values, directed by Ira Kodner, M.D., is a University-wide center with activities and representation from all schools. Its activities enhance knowledge regarding the nature of ethics and human values in the world through community outreach, education, research and service.