Ethical issues - human

Question 1

Ethics introduction

Answer 1

Ethical issues arise in psychological research when there is conflict between the rights of the participants and the aims of the researcher. Therefore, when conducting research all psychologists must follow ethical guidelines. These are a set of rules designed so that research is morally right and that the rights of the participants are being met. In not following these guidelines research will be seen to be in breach of ethics.

Question 2

Define right to withdraw

Answer 2

Participants should be allowed to leave the study at any time and should know that they are able to do this. They should also be able to remove their data at the end of the study if they want to.

Question 3

Define confidentiality

Answer 3

Participants should not be identifiable within a study. Thus, participant’s names will be anonymised and should not be published. Sometimes participants will be given a number or a pseudonym – a fake name.

Question 4

Define informed consent

Answer 4

Participants should give their consent to take part in the research. To be informed consent participants should fully understand what they are agreeing to do: The purpose of the study. What will be required from them, and their rights as a participant (confidentiality and withdrawal). Their decision to participate should not be influenced by the power of the researcher.

Question 5

Define deception

Answer 5

This is withholding information that might affect the participant decision to take part in the research. Participants should not be deliberately misled about the purpose of a study. This should happen only when researchers have no other way to conduct the investigation and only if participants are not likely to become distressed.

Question 6

Define protection from harm

Answer 6

The risks the participants are exposed to during the study should not be greater than the risks they might be expected to face in everyday life.

Question 7

Social

Answer 7

Milgram - Deception, Right to withdraw
Burger - Protection from harm, informed consent

Question 8

Bio

Answer 8

Raine used pet scans which are invasive due to injection of radioactive tracer , also participants taken off medication to be able to do pet scan. Raine participants knew they were taking a pet scan so no deception
Brendgen- written consent from parents
Leve- recruited via adoption agencies and recruited via opt out

Question 9

Cog

Answer 9

HM - Case studies in cognitive psychology regularly give participants a pseudonym to protect their identity, such as H.M., so this research is therefore ethical. HM could possibly not full inform as not fully understand what agreeing too due to brain damage

Baddeley- the ppts were deceived into thinking that they were just doing a memory task, when in reality they were also doing a task when the true aim of the study was actually hidden from them. Baddeley procedure involved doing a memory task so did not put at harm.

Question 10

Learning

Answer 10

Watson and Raynor - Protection from harm, confidentiality, deception
Bandura - Presumptive consent- The children were too young to give consent themselves. Their nursery teachers agreed for the children to take part, and it can be assumed their parents did too