This research aimed at identifying the ethical aspects in the social representations of clients on the humanization and to argue the implications of these for the nursing care. A qualitative study was carried out whose data collection was by means of semi-structured interview and participant observation with 24 patients hospitalized in a public institution. The social representations about humanization of care gain contours of the ethics and the moral, in the establishment of gradients of merit of the good treatment, and resolutive actions, clinical evaluation and respect to the right of the client. The right to the good treatment is not equal for all, what indicates the possible differentiations in social representations about citizenship.
Nursing care; Humanization of assistance; Ethics