The Market for Kidneys: Bridging Introductory Courses in Economics and Ethics.

This article contributes to the literature on interdisciplinary teaching by describing, analyzing, and evaluating an interdisciplinary intervention while students are still gaining disciplinary grounding. The intervention bridges courses in microeconomics and ethics. It focuses on the travelling concepts of voluntariness and value in a potential market for kidneys and finds that a 15-minute video clip on travelling concepts can help students build interdisciplinary skills. Students in a control group watched a clip only on the specific issue of a market for kidneys, but not using travelling concepts. An exploratory survey (N=44) indicates that the intervention increases interdisciplinary skills more than the control. However, students in the control group reported a deeper interdisciplinary grasp of that specific topic. Teaching an issue through travelling concepts can hence be seen as an investment in general interdisciplinary skills. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]