In the introduction to this digital textbook, we meet Cheryl, an imaginary massage colleague. We learn that Cheryl is a truly kind and caring person. She looks out for everyone and is attuned to people’s emotions. When people are feeling down, Cheryl is the first to check in, give a hug, and ask how she can help out.

We also learn that Cheryl is flirtatious with clients. She calls them by nicknames like Romeo and Cowgirl, hugs every client when she first meets them, and doesn’t seem to notice that some clients feel embarrassed and taken aback by her affection. She puts her arm around clients as she guides them to the session room and sometimes touches their hair or clothing unnecessarily. Watching Cheryl interact with clients makes her massage colleagues slightly uncomfortable.

Should someone speak up? Is this an ethical issue or is Cheryl just a loving and affectionate person? Is Cheryl placing clients, colleagues or the reputation of the massage profession at risk?

As educators and seasoned massage professionals, we know the answers to these questions. For our students, graduating to take their first massage jobs, these questions feel confusing. To understand how to act in this, and other challenging ethical scenarios, students will need a strong knowledge base and a highly trained set of behavioral skills.

Through painstaking research and applied humanistic instructional design, this modern ethics textbook takes a fresh approach to teaching and learning massage ethics. Lessons include extensive use of video presentations, client-therapist scenarios, and activities adapted from emotional and social intelligence-building curriculum.

Lesson 01 – Core Concepts in Ethics: We begin our exploration of massage ethics by defining ethics through a discussion of words like morals, values, character, good, bad, right, and wrong. We’ll examine the compelling evolutionary basis for ethics and we’ll meet the Greek philosophers who inspired Western ethics. We’ll discuss the intersection of human rights and ethics and inspect the core values of the massage profession. We’ll learn how our personal values and beliefs can support or hinder our professional ethics.

Lesson 02 – Get to Know Your Personal Ethics: Self-awareness is a key factor in professionalism and strong ethical behavior. In this lesson, we’ll explore our personal values, character traits, beliefs, needs, wants, and expectations. We’ll use what we’ve learned about ourselves as individuals to write a personal code of ethics. This knowledge will help us look out for personal beliefs that might conflict with professional ethics, and support our efforts to act ethically in our massage practices.

Lesson 03 – The Massage Therapy Code of Ethics: Professional ethics are the moral rules adopted by a profession to assist members in understanding the difference between right and wrong. Professional ethics aim to prevent the exploitation of clients, protect the individuals who make up the profession, and preserve the integrity and reputation of the profession itself. In this lesson, we’ll take a deep dive into the ten ethical commitments we make to the massage profession. With explicit language, we’ll come to know the standard of practice and recognize behaviors that are ethical and unethical.

Lesson 04 – Working Through Ethical Dilemmas: In this lesson, we’ll learn all of the information and skills we need to develop our moral sensitivity and take action in situations that involve strong moral judgment and morally courageous action. We’ll identify common factors that cause good massage therapists to behave unethically, and learn where we can look for ethical guidance. Using widely-accepted ethical decision-making models, we’ll work through a number of complex ethical dilemmas and determine how to take action. We’ll come to understand how complaints about unethical massage therapists are reported, and discuss professional censure and sanctions.

Lesson 05 – Massage Law: This lesson is written specifically for massage students who may feel confused about the process they must follow to obtain their massage credentials, participate in continuing education activities, and renew their licenses. The information in this lesson will help us work within the law and meet the requirements for massage professionals in our individual states.

Having read this digital textbook and completed all of the learning tasks associated with lessons, students will be ready to work professionally with a strong understanding of their ethical obligations. They’ll know how to maintain the highest ethical standards and recognize unethical behavior. They’ll know how to work through a process to determine how to act in ethically complex situations.

TEXTBOOK INTRODUCTION AND ORIENTATION 

LESSON 01: CORE CONCEPTS IN ETHICS

• Introduction, Learning Objectives, and Terminology
• What is Ethics?
• A Brief History of Ethics
• Human Rights and Ethics
• Massage Values and Ethics
• Factors that Influence Ethics
• Personal Verses Professional Ethics
• Let’s Talk Ethics
• Apply It!
• Quiz

LESSON 02: GET TO KNOW YOUR PERSONAL ETHICS

• Introduction, Learning Objectives, and Terminology
• Your Values and Ethics
• Your Character and Ethics
• Your Beliefs and Ethics
• Your Needs, Wants, Expectations, and Ethics
• Your Self-Awareness and Ethics
• Your Personal Code of Ethics
• Let’s Talk Ethics
• Apply It!
• Quiz

 LESSON 3: THE MASSAGE THERAPY CODE OF ETHICS

• Introduction, Learning Objectives, and Terminology
• Commitment to Value All People
• Commitment to Do No Harm
• Commitment to Healthy Therapeutic Relationships
• Commitment to Respect Client Rights
• Commitment to Client Informed Consent
• Commitment to Client Confidentiality
• Commitment to High Quality Care
• Commitment to Honest Representation
• Commitment to Business Integrity
• Commitment to Professional Development
• The Complete Code of Ethics
• Let’s Talk Ethics
• Apply It!
• Quiz

LESSON 4: WORKING THROUGH ETHICAL DILEMMAS

• Introduction, Learning Objectives, and Terminology
• When Good Massage Therapists Behave Unethically
• Sources of Ethical Guidance
• Rest’s Model for Moral Action
• Kidder’s Three Principles and Ethical Checkpoints
• Professional Censure and Sanctions
• What is Happening in These Scenarios?
• Let’s Talk Ethics
• Apply It!
• Quiz

 LESSON 5: MASSAGE LAWS AND REGULATIONS

• Introduction, Learning Objectives, and Terminology
• Types of Massage Credentials
• Required Education
• Obtaining Massage Credentials
• The Massage Scope of Practice
• Continuing Education
• Managing Your Massage Credentials
• Let’s Talk Ethics
• Apply It!
• Quiz

 FINAL EXAMINATION

• Lesson & Topic Structure: The thoughtful instructional design of this textbook organizes contents into carefully sequenced learning chunks. Students can finish topics in short study sessions (average 20 minutes). This sense of making regular progress improves student motivation.
• Text Translation: So long as they use Chrome as their browser, students with English as a second language can instantly translate the text into their native language so that they never miss a concept.
• Visually Appealing: Concepts come alive with striking imagery and appealing graphic design. Printed textbooks are limited by page number and keep visuals to a minimum. In the digital world, more is more when it comes to visual aids.
• Video Content: Video content covers the key concepts in the text using vivid images, graphic elements, voice-over, and strong instructional design.
• Listen Along Audio: The listen-along feature is included with topics that don’t feature a video presentation. Students can listen to these topics while they read the text to improve reading comprehension, or listen to lessons while they commute, exercise, or relax.
• Standard Textbook Features: Standard textbook features like introductions, learning objectives, summaries, references, and resources get a digital upgrade with subtle animations and click-to-view options that invite learners to engage with content they might otherwise skip over.
• Research Informed: Each textbook is written by massage professionals and carefully researched for accuracy and relevance. We make regular updates to content and can address content issues immediately (something printed textbooks can’t do).
• Easy Navigation: Clever web navigation puts an entire textbook a click away and provides an ongoing outline to help students mentally frame the content they are learning.
• Check It Off Progress: Oh, the motivating power of a checkmark! Students get a dose of satisfaction when they mark topics and lessons complete and see the progress bar advance.
• Learning Games: Learning games strengthen student concept comprehension, memory recall, and critical-thinking skills. Games give instance feedback so students never reinforce incorrect information. Games can be reset for repeated content drill and practice. This textbook includes 13 learning games.
• Let’s Talk Boundaries Interviews: Video interviews with massage professionals connect students to unique voices and their massage community. Students hear about ethics in action from a variety of informed massage professionals.
• Downloadable Resources: Downloads for this textbook include three different ethical decision-making forms, and the complete code of ethics for the massage profession.
• Take Notes App: Students can take notes, organize, save, and print notes from within their textbooks. Students can also use the app to take notes from instructor lectures so that all their class notes for a topic are in one place.
• Quizzes: Each lesson concludes with a 10-question, multiple-choice quiz from a test bank of 20 questions. Quizzes give instant feedback so that learners never reinforce incorrect information. When students reset quizzes, the program exchanges some questions, and shuffles response options for drill and practice study.
• Story & Scenario: The regular use of stories and client-therapist scenarios place important concepts in a real-world context and improve critical thinking skills. Students apply ethical decision making models to five final scenarios and receive instant feedback on their choices.
• Interactive Content: The textbooks at Massage Mastery Online take advantage of design-forward web animations that increase student attention, learning, and engagement.
• On-The-Go Learning: Learning must fit into the margins of adult lives to be practical. This content is designed for on-the-go learning using a computer, tablet, or phone.
• Environmentally Friendly: No trees were harmed in the making of this textbook! Improve student learning outcomes and reduce your carbon footprint at the same time.
• Final Textbook Examination: This final exam is composed of 30 multiple-choice questions from a 60-question test bank. The exam gives instance feedback on item choices and builds the testing stamina students will need to pass longer examinations like the MBLEx.