The climate emergency marks a turning point for clearly addressing the three pillars of sustainability: environmental, social, and economic. This focus is particularly crucial in design engineering, as design engineers make significant decisions impacting all three areas throughout the entire project. In parallel, third-generation ethics, as defined by Serres at the end of the 20th century, prioritizes responsibility towards the environment and global sustainability. For the first time, it includes non-human beings and systemic relationships in its considerations. In third-generation global ethics, the entire planet is the stage, and responsibility extends to all forms of life.

Recognizing that sustainability is now a fundamental and transversal theme in university curricula, as outlined in Spanish Royal Decree 822/2021 –which incorporates the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as guiding principles for study programs–, this research seeks to explore the role of universities in promoting the adoption of sustainable habits, attitudes, and values in their students' future professional practices. Furthermore, it aims to utilize this context to examine the moral development of master's degree students. Thus, the primary research questions posed to define the initial state of the issue are as follows: Are students aware of the ethical implications arising from adopting a sustainable perspective? Do students recognize their own responsibility in project decision-making within the profession? Do students have the tools to address moral dilemmas, identify them as such, and make decisions accordingly?

This article presents a pilot study designed to assess the level of moral development among students enrolled in the Master’s Degree in Advanced Studies in Design-Barcelona (MBDesign) for the 2023/24 academic year. This program, jointly offered by Universitat Politècnica de Catlaunya (UPC) and Universitat de Barcelona (UB), incorporates reflection on social and ethical responsibilities as a core competency, and emphasizes sustainability and social commitment as transversal competencies.

In the classroom, students analyze various codes of ethics, examine the underlying ethical principles, and study Kohlberg's stages of moral development. Building on this foundation, they engage with a range of moral dilemmas related to the three pillars of sustainability that may arise in professional practice. This process culminates in a comprehensive debate on these topics and the decisions made in response to the dilemmas. In an initial assessment of the experience, a certain resistance to assuming personal responsibility in the face of the presented moral dilemmas is identified. Although students do recognize these situations as ones that will have subsequent consequences –and thus implications for the environment, society, and the economy–, a gap between personal responsibility and future consequences is one of the key findings. These results show the necessity to rethink how applied ethics in engineering is addressed in earlier years of study.

Keywords: Engineering design, applied ethics, moral dilemmas, teaching ethics, code of ethics.