Ethics, Norms and Values

Three words name this unit, and they are easy to mix up:

Word	What it means	An example from school
ethics	the principles of right and wrong that guide what people do; professional ethics are those of a job	A teacher marks every student’s paper fairly, whoever the student is.
norms	the usual, expected ways of behaving in a group or a society, often unwritten	Students stand up when a visitor enters the classroom.
values	the things a person or a group believes are important	honesty, respect, hard work, kindness

The unit opens with four pictures of people at work and asks you to talk about their professional ethics, norms and values:

Picture	What it shows	Ethics, norms and values of the job
a doctor in a white coat with a stethoscope, examining a child lying on a bed	a doctor	Put the patient’s health first; tell the truth about an illness; keep what patients say confidential (private); treat rich and poor alike; never ask for money before treating someone who is dying.
a woman singing into a studio microphone, with headphones on	a singer	Sing her own songs or give credit to the writer; never copy someone else’s work; arrive on time for recordings and shows; respect her audience.
a man in a white shirt and tie with stripes on his shoulders and a wings badge, wearing dark glasses	an airline pilot	Safety first, always; never fly after drinking alcohol or without enough rest; follow every checklist; tell passengers honestly about delays.
a woman teaching a class of students in blue uniforms	a teacher	Treat every student fairly; come prepared; never hit or humiliate a student; keep students’ results private; set a good example.

Before you read

What kind of text it is

The text is a short article by four researchers who study business and negotiation, William Maddux, Peter H. Kim, Tetsushi Okumura and Jeanne Brett. It appeared in the Harvard Business Review in 2012, and explains, for managers, what they found in their own studies of apologies in the United States and Japan, which they had published in full in 2011 in a journal called International Negotiation. They write as we (“Our own work found…”), and they give examples, numbers and reasons, like a short report.

The text, part by part

1. Two countries trip over one word

America and Japan have worked together in business and politics for decades, yet they still trip over (have trouble with) something that seems simple: the apology. Neither side fully understands what the other means by it. Two examples:

• Most Americans were unmoved (not touched) when Akio Toyoda, the head of Toyota, apologized effusively (with a lot of feeling) in 2010, after widespread reports of faults in Toyota cars.
• Japan bristled (became angry) in 2001 when a US submarine commander didn’t apologize at once after his submarine hit and sank a Japanese fishing boat near Hawaii.

2. Every culture has its own rules

The trouble isn’t only between these two countries. Almost every culture has its own rules for when and how to say sorry. In India, other researchers have found, people apologize far less often than in Japan. In Hong Kong, apologies are so prevalent (common) and ritualized (done by habit, like a ceremony) that people are inured to them: they are so used to them that they hardly notice them any more.

3. The core issue: blame

The writers’ own studies found the core (central) difference: what an apology says about culpability, that is, who is to blame.

• Americans hear an apology as an admission of wrongdoing: “I did it, it’s my fault.”
• Japanese hear it as a wish to repair a damaged relationship, with no blame necessarily meant: “I’m sorry this happened between us.”

This difference changes how much traction an apology gains: how much effect it has on the listener.

4. The first study: who says sorry more?

The researchers asked university students in the US and Japan about apologies. The American students were more likely to say that an apology means you are guilty. The Japanese students were more willing to apologize even when they weren’t responsible for what happened, and perhaps for this reason they apologized much more often: asked to remember the week before, the Japanese students counted 11.05 apologies on average, the Americans only 4.51.

Notice what the numbers are: an average of what students remembered (recalled). Nobody followed them round counting. And the first study was small: in the full report, 40 Japanese and 38 American students, all young women, took part. A survey like this shows a difference worth studying; it can’t tell you how every Japanese or American person behaves.

5. The second study: can sorry repair trust?

Next they tested how useful (the text says the utility of) an apology is for repairing trust. Students from both countries imagined they were managers and watched a video: a woman applying for a job as an accountant apologized for having deliberately (on purpose) filed a wrong tax return for an earlier client. The Japanese students were more ready than their American counterparts (the students in the same position in the other country) to believe her assertion (firm statement) that she wouldn’t do it again, and to give her the job. The writers think this is because Americans have an inclination (tendency) to connect an apology with guilt: for them, she had just admitted she was dishonest.

6. Why the difference?

The writers link it to a wider habit of mind. People in the West tend to attribute events to individuals’ actions: when something goes wrong, they ask who did it? So in the US, I’m sorry means “I am the one who is responsible.” Japan, like many East Asian countries, has a more group-oriented culture, so there an apology is heard as “It is unfortunate that this happened.” Researchers who compared apologies in America and China found the same pattern: American apologies fix personal responsibility; Chinese ones look at the larger consequences of the transgression (the wrong that was done).

7. The lesson for business

Only managers who understand such differences can use an apology well: to help negotiations (talks to reach an agreement), to settle conflicts and to rebuild trust. And apologies are only one part of a wider semantic disconnect between East and West: the same words carry different meanings, and in the rush to globalization (the world’s countries doing business together) this is often ignored. Managers should listen for such small nuances (slight differences of meaning), which are easily lost in translation.

Words from the text

Words linked here open in English Vocabulary, where you can see an example and practice them in the word game. The meanings below are the ones the words have in this text.

Word	Meaning here
trip over (something)	to have difficulty with something, as if stumbling over it
unmoved	not touched or affected by feelings
effusive	showing (too) much feeling, warmly or excitedly
widespread	found or reported in many places
bristle	to become suddenly annoyed or offended
prevalent	common; found everywhere
ritualized	done as a fixed habit, like a ceremony
inured (to)	so used to something (usually unpleasant) that it no longer affects you
core	central, most important
culpability	being to blame for something wrong
traction	here, the effect or influence something has
utility	usefulness
counterpart	a person in the same position somewhere else
assertion	a statement that you strongly believe is true
inclination	a natural tendency to think or act in a certain way
attribute (to)	to say or believe that something is caused by a particular thing
transgression	an act that breaks a rule or does wrong
semantic	connected with the meanings of words and sentences
nuance	a very slight difference in meaning, feeling or color

A. Find the words

B. Match the halves

C. Answer the questions

D. Your own apology

A contraction (contracted form) joins two words into one, with an apostrophe (’) where letters are left out: I am → I’m. In speech, almost everyone uses them; in writing, they belong in friendly letters, emails and conversations, not in formal letters or reports.

Contraction	Full form	Sounds like	IPA
I’m	I am	“ime” (rhymes with time)	/aɪm/
you’re	you are	like your	/jɔː/
he’s	he is, he has	“heez”	/hiːz/
she’s	she is, she has	“sheez”	/ʃiːz/
it’s	it is, it has	“its”	/ɪts/
we’re	we are	“weer” (rhymes with here)	/wɪə/
they’re	they are	like there and their	/ðeə/
I’ve	I have	“ive” (rhymes with five)	/aɪv/
I’d	I would, I had	“ide” (rhymes with ride)	/aɪd/
they’ll	they will	“thale” (rhymes with mail)	/ðeɪl/

The contraction is one syllable: say I’m in one beat, not I-am quickly.

To apologize is to say you are sorry for something you did that hurt or troubled someone. A good apology does two or three things, in this order:

1. Says sorry: I’m sorry…, I apologize for…
2. Says what you did, and takes the blame: It’s my fault. I shouldn’t have…
3. Puts it right, if it can: Let me clean it up. I’ll bring it tomorrow.

A short reason can come after the apology (I didn’t see you), but never instead of it.

A. Three conversations

The task’s three short conversations show three ways of apologizing, and three ways of answering:

• Conversation I: Mingma arrives late and says I hope you’ll forgive me for being late, with a reason: a flat tyre. Sujan forgives him kindly: That’s quite alright. It can happen to anyone.
• Conversation II: Nabina says I’m sorry to Binod for keeping his book so long, and adds I didn’t mean to. Binod answers No problem, because he won’t need the book until next semester.
• Conversation III: Kiran hits Kuber with his umbrella and says I apologize, with a reason. Kuber accepts it, but adds a gentle warning: Be careful when you’re passing people.

Expressions to use

	Apologizing	Responding to an apology
small things, informal	Oops, sorry! Sorry about that. My bad.	That’s OK. No problem. It happens. Never mind.
everyday	I’m sorry that… I’m so sorry. It’s my fault. I should have… I didn’t mean to…	Don’t worry about it. That’s all right. No harm done.
serious or formal	I apologize for… Please forgive me. I hope you’ll forgive me for… Please accept my apologies.	I forgive you. Apology accepted. Thank you for saying so.

B. Conversations from clues

C. Say sorry, and answer

The present continuous (also called the present progressive) shows an action in progress: started, but not finished. It is made of am / is / are + the -ing form of the verb:

	Positive	Negative	Question
I	I am (I’m) reading.	I**’m not reading**.	Am I reading?
he / she / it	She is (she’s) reading.	She isn’t (is not) reading.	Is she reading?
you / we / they	They are (they’re) reading.	They aren’t (are not) reading.	Are they reading?

We use it for:

Use	Example	Clue words
something happening right now, as we speak	Be quiet! The baby is sleeping.	now, at the moment, look!, listen!, be quiet!
something going on around now, for a while, even if not this second	This week I’m reading* a book about Everest.*	these days, this week, this month, today
a situation that is changing	More and more people are buying electric scooters.	more and more, getting, these days
a future arrangement already made	She’s traveling* to Dhangadhi next weekend.*	a future time: tonight, tomorrow, next week

Compare the present simple (Unit 4), for habits, facts, long-lasting situations and timetables: I read every evening. Water boils at 100 °C. The bus leaves at six.

Spelling the -ing form

Verb ends in	Rule	Examples
most verbs	add -ing	read → reading, play → playing
a silent -e	drop the e	make → making, write → writing
one vowel + one consonant, stressed	double the consonant	run → running, sit → sitting, begin → beginning
-ie	-ie → -ying	lie → lying, die → dying

Travel becomes traveling in American spelling and travelling in British; both are correct.

A. Bob’s Sunday afternoon

In the picture, Bob’s whole family is in the garden on a Sunday afternoon, each person with a name label, and Bob tells us what everyone is doing.

B. The correct form

A pie chart is a circle cut into slices, like a pie. The whole circle is 100%, and each slice shows one part’s share. Two pie charts side by side let you compare: two places, or two years. To describe them in a paragraph:

1. Introduce the charts: what they show, where and when. The pie charts show… in Nepal in 2004 and 2011.
2. Describe the main point of each: the biggest slice and the smallest.
3. Compare them: what grew, what shrank, what stayed about the same, with the numbers.
4. If you like, end with one sentence on what the comparison shows.

Useful language:

To say	Use
a share	accounts for, makes up, takes up, represents 40%
about a fraction	more than one third (over 33.3%), nearly half (just under 50%), about a quarter (around 25%), the vast majority (over 90%)
a change	rose / increased / grew from 2.8% to 5.3%; fell / dropped / decreased from 28.7% to 22.2%; remained almost the same
how much	slightly (a little), sharply (a lot); almost doubled; six times as many
a contrast	whereas, while, on the other hand, in contrast, but

A. The model: who owns their home?

The book’s two pie charts show households by ownership of their house in Nepal’s urban areas (towns and cities) and rural areas (villages). Tap a row to see each comparison:

The model interpretation has three paragraphs:

• Rural areas: 92% of families own their house, only 6% rent, and 2% neither own nor rent.
• Urban areas: 57% own, 40% rent (more than one third, since a third is about 33%), and 3% neither own nor rent.
• The comparison: fewer town families own their house; renting is more than six times as common in towns (40 ÷ 6 ≈ 6.7); and the families who neither own nor rent are a similar small share in both.

B. Household spending, 2004 and 2011

What households spent on	2004	2011
food	59%	61.5%
housing	9.5%	11%
education	2.8%	5.3%
other non-food	28.7%	22.2%

In your final exam, a description of a chart, table or diagram is a Guided writing I task: about 100 words, 5 marks. Use the numbers, compare, and don’t give reasons the chart doesn’t show (or mark them as a guess: This may be because…).

Before you read

What kind of text it is

It is a real letter of apology from a company to its customers. JetBlue Airways is an American airline that began flying in February 2000. On 14 February 2007 an ice storm hit the northeast of the United States, around New York, where JetBlue had its main base. JetBlue tried to keep flying while other airlines cancelled early; its planes and crews got stuck, some passengers waited on planes at New York’s JFK airport for six hours or more, and over the next days it cancelled more than a thousand flights. A few days later its founder and chief executive (CEO), David Neeleman, wrote this letter to the airline’s customers, and JetBlue published a Customer Bill of Rights, a written promise of what passengers would get when flights were badly delayed or cancelled.

The letter, part by part

1. Sorry, three times

It opens with the apology itself, said in three ways: the company is sorry, embarrassed, and above all deeply sorry. No excuse comes first.

2. What happened

The past week was the worst in JetBlue’s seven-year history. After a severe winter ice storm in the Northeast, passengers suffered unacceptable delays, cancelled flights, lost baggage and other problems. The storm disrupted (broke up the normal working of) the movement of the planes, and worse, of the pilots and inflight crewmembers, who needed those planes to reach the airports where they were to work. It was also the busy Presidents’ Day holiday weekend, so there were few seats for rebooking, and customers phoning JetBlue waited a very long time, or couldn’t get through at all, which hindered (held back) the airline’s recovery.

3. How sorry, and why it hurts

Words, he writes, can’t express how sorry the company is for the anxiety, frustration and inconvenience customers felt. It is especially sad because JetBlue was founded on a promise to bring humanity back to air travel and make flying happier and easier. Last week it failed to keep that promise.

4. What JetBlue is doing about it

The company has started corrective steps (actions to put things right), part of a comprehensive (complete) plan: better and quicker information for customers, more tools and resources for its crew, and better ways of handling problems. He is confident JetBlue will emerge (come out of this) as a more reliable airline.

5. The Bill of Rights

Most importantly, JetBlue has published its Customer Bill of Rights: its official promise of how it will handle interruptions to flights from now on, with details of compensation (money or credit given to make up for a loss). He also has a video message about it.

6. Asking for another chance

Customers deserved better, much better. Nothing matters more than winning back their trust, and everyone at JetBlue hopes for the chance to welcome them on board again. He signs it with his name and his title: Founder and CEO.

The parts of a good letter of apology

The letter does what every good apology does, in order: it says sorry, says what went wrong, takes responsibility, says what will change, offers something to make up for the harm, and asks for trust. Try the same moves on a letter of our own:

Words from the letter

Word	Meaning here
operational	connected with the way a business runs every day
subject (someone) to	to make someone go through something unpleasant
disrupt	to stop something from continuing in the normal way
crewmembers	the people who work on a ship or plane
scarce	hard to find; not enough
hinder	to make it difficult for someone to do something, or for something to happen
inconvenience	trouble or problems that affect what you need or want
corrective	meant to put something right
comprehensive	complete, including everything
emerge	to come out of a dark, closed or hidden place, or a difficult time
compensation	money or something else given to make up for a loss

A. Match the words

B. Answer the questions

C. A journey that went wrong

In the listening, a young man meets a young woman he has met before, but he can’t remember her name, and he has to apologize. Read the questions in B first, then listen, as many times as you need. CDC hasn’t put this recording online (the video called Unit 5 on its YouTube channel is the funeral phone call of Unit 4), so listen to it in class, and practice with our own talk below.

A. Before you listen

B. The textbook’s audio: answers

These answers follow CDC’s teachers’ guide, which gives the answers but not the words of the recording.

C. Forgetting a name

A story told as if it were happening now uses the present continuous for the scene going on, and the present simple for each new event and for states:

Sophiya is sitting in class. (the scene) Her teacher calls her name. (an event) She feels embarrassed. (a state)

This is how commentators describe a football match live, and how we describe a picture or a daydream.

A. Sophiya’s daydream

Future arrangements

The present continuous with a future time talks about a plan that is already arranged: tickets bought, a time agreed, people told.

• We’re going* to the cinema tonight.* (We have planned it.)
• Tomorrow I’m seeing* my doctor in the morning.* (I have an appointment.)
• Where are you going this year? (asking about someone’s plans)

Compare The film starts at 7 (a timetable, present simple) and I will probably go (a decision or guess, not yet arranged).

B. Complete with any verb

How to write a letter or email of apology

1. To and Subject for an email (Subject: My apology), or your address and the date for a letter.
2. Greeting: Dear Nisha, (a friend), Dear Sir/Madam, (formal).
3. The apology, first: I am writing to apologize for… I am so sorry that…
4. What happened, honestly, taking the blame: It was my fault. I should have…
5. How they must have felt: I know it must have been…
6. Putting it right: I would like to make it up to you… From now on, I will…
7. A friendly close: I hope you can forgive me. Then Your friend, / Yours sincerely, (formal, Dear Mr. Rai) / Yours faithfully, (formal, Dear Sir), and your name.

In your final exam, a letter or email is a Free writing II task (about 200 words, 8 marks), marked on its content, organization, language and layout.

A clause is a group of words with its own subject and verb. An independent clause makes sense on its own (the bus was late); a dependent clause has a subject and a verb but can’t stand alone, because it begins with a word like because or when (because the bus was late…). Sentences are named by the clauses they contain:

Type	What it has	Example
simple	one independent clause	The baby cried for food.
compound	two (or more) independent clauses, joined by a coordinating conjunction: for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so (remember FANBOYS)	It was raining, so we stayed inside.
complex	one independent clause and one or more dependent clauses, which begin with a subordinator (because, when, after, although, since, as, if, while) or a relative pronoun (who, which, that)	Because the meat had gone cold, I heated it on the gas stove.

In a compound sentence, a comma usually goes before the conjunction. In a complex sentence, a dependent clause that comes first is followed by a comma (When the bell rang, we left.); one that comes second usually needs none (We left when the bell rang.).

Practice on this unit in the style of the final exam (Grade 9’s exam follows the SEE’s kind of chart). Try each one as in the exam, then open the answer.