Ethics

Question 1

What are the six types of ethical issue?

Answer 1

• Informed consent (accurate set of guidelines that a participant can agree to before an experiment)
• Deception (Lying to participants in order to make an experiment more accurate)
• Right to withdraw (The right each person has to leave the experiment)
• Protection from harm (The right each participant has to safety from harm)
• Confidentiality (The concealment of information according to desires of participants)
• Privacy (The participants’ ability to feel private during an experiment)

Question 2

How do you avoid issues with informed consent?

Answer 2

• Sign a document beforehand with comprehesive information
• Presumptive consent (asking a similar group if they would consent) can also be used

Question 3

How do you avoid issues with deception?

Answer 3

• Need for deception must be approved by an ethics committee
• Full debrief used to discuss concerns or to ask about withholding information

Question 4

How do you avoid issues with the right to withdraw?

Answer 4

• Participants should always be allowed to leave tha experiment
• Participants should be given the opportunity to withdraw at all points

Question 5

How do you avoid issues with protection from harm?

Answer 5

• Avoid risks that are greater than the ones you would experience in day to day life
• Stop the study if harm is suspected

Question 6

How do you avoid issues with confidentiality?

Answer 6

• Do not record names in published research
• Use false names in published research

Question 7

How do you avoid issues with privacy?

Answer 7

• Do not study without informed consent unless the experiment is conducted in a public location
• Do not ask personal or invasive questions

Question 8

What are the ways of dealing with ethical issues?

Answer 8

• BPS Code of Conduct (A set of ethical guidelines that will cause a job loss if broken)
• Cost-benefit analysis (Judges the costs aginst the benefits to decide if the improvements are worth suffering)
• Ethics committee (A group of medical professionals and non-professionals that approve a study before it is carried out, where a researcher can suggest solutions to the issues)
• Punishment (The BPS can remove individuals from psychological practice)