pros and cons of ethics

Question 1

pros of ethical guidelines

Answer 1

To avoid physical and psychological harm to participants. As humans have feelings and can experience pain, ethical issues are those involved when deciding whether we should carry out a certain study or not.

→ Protect the rights of participants, especially children and those in institutions. When in doubt a researcher should consult colleagues or at least get a second opinion and should not work outside their area of competence.

→ If participants are pressured, valid data may not be found, therefore the guidelines allow psychologists to put participants at ease. Also confidentiality means participants are more likely to co-operate fully.

→ If consent is given, psychologists themselves are protected against complaints

→ Competence means psychologists can be trusted, participants can therefore be more trusting and more studies can be done. The public must have confidence in psychology to maintain a positive public perception.

Question 2

cons

Answer 2

1. Demand characteristics
   One of the major weaknesses of following the ethical guidelines is that if psychologists fully inform participants about the purpose of the study and make them aware of what is going to happen. The likelihood of demand characteristics taking place increases, this affects the validity of research, providing inaccurate results.
2. Protecting the individual versus harming the group
   It is the psychologists responsibility to protect participants from physical and mental harm, however the social group to which they belong (the group they represent in the research) maybe harmed as a consequence of research findings, this then limits what can be studied.
3. Protecting the individual versus benefiting society
   Within the ethical guidelines psychologists are prevented from using deception, as it is seen as being. distressing and may affect the well being of participants. However, in order to investigate issues such as obedience, and obtain accurate results, some level of deception is needed. Therefore, studies that do break these guidelines are often criticised as they are seen to cause distress to the participant. Aronson (1992) points out that social psychologists ought to carry out socially meaningful research, because it can benefit others.

Question 3

double obligation dilemma

Answer 3

4. The ‘double obligation’ dilemma
   In general the view is that the more important the issue:
   * The greater the potential benefit for society
   * The more likely an individual participant is to experience distress and discomfort
   This is because the more important the issue, the more essential the use of deception becomes. Therefore the problem the psychologist is faced with here is that the use of deception both contributes enormously to our understanding of human behaviour, helping to satisfy the obligation to society and psychology. Yet at the same time significantly increases participants distress, detracting from the responsibility to protect the participant.

To deal with this Aronson (1992) proposed a cost-benefit analysis. This weighs up how much good (benefits to society) will derive from doing the research against how much bad will happen to the participant. This allowed the psychologist to weigh up the pros and cons of their study, enabling them to give justification as to why ethical guidelines were broke