From the blogs I read last week the majority seemed to view ethics as too strict, and claimed that they limit research practices unnecessarily. However I didn’t see any mention of the core reasons why these ethics are important, beyond the moral justification of it being “the right thing to do”. So in an attempt to level the playing field a little, here I am arguing that ethics rarely restrict research, and their strictness is beneficial for psychology.
Many bloggers made the point that in adhering to ethical principles we sacrifice the validity of the results, in an attempt to avoid harm to participants. It was argued that this is a poor trade off, as the as potential harm is generally minimal. An example given was the dilemma of informed consent in observations, doing so compromises the validity of the results and after all why can’t you just get the validity after observing? Well ethics is a very much a catchall system and is rather general in its terms. This prevents unethical studies from slipping through the net, which could occur with vague and less rigid ethical guidelines. So rather than explicitly listing cases when consent is needed, it simply says that you must obtain consent. But doesn’t this overly restrict research? Not at all, in reality studies can get leniency on certain guidelines if it is deemed necessary. In fact deception is used in up to 50-75% of published reports (Adair, Dushenko & Lindsay, 1985). However this can only be used if the study requires it, not just because it would make things easier for the researcher.
People give the example that Milgram’s study would never make it past ethical guidelines these days, but Milgram’s study has been replicated many times since (links included below). So as you can see rigid ethics are important for preventing ethical studies from slipping through the net but ethics can be readdressed to an extent in individual cases if it required, thus rarely restrict research.
However studies have shown that most people did not mind being deceived (http://psp.sagepub.com/content/14/4/664.abstract). If people don’t mind being deceived then what is the harm? Similarly Milgram reported that most (82%) participants reported were glad to have taken part. A few studies have shown that in general most people are largely indifferent to the matter of deception. However dissatisfaction amongst even a few participants in each study can have a big impact collectively. In the Milgram’s experiment of the forty participants, five participants weren’t glad to have participated (12%). Considering the number of studies that occur every year, this degree of dissatisfaction would be devastating to psychology as whole if it occurred regularly. Certainly these are extreme examples, but it shows how disregard for ethics can be cause dissatisfied participants. As I’m sure you’re all aware psychology has a history of controversial studies; Milgram, Harlows Monkeys, Zimbardo to name a few. These certainly are some extreme and rare cases, but I’m sure your aware of the impact that even a few extreme examples can have on the public view of psychology. Just think about which studies are best known to the public when you mention psychological research. Though I wasn’t able to find a more scientific example to illustrate my point here, Let’s just view the top 5 searches when I google “Famous psychology experiments”. Zimbardo and Milgram can be seen on all of them, with one of them being the wiki page of Milgram. Little Albert and Harlow’s monkeys amongst others can be seen. In order to move beyond this we need to ensure a sound moral code. This isn’t just important for ensuring psychology as a respectable and acknowledged science but also to ensure future research. If participants don’t feel their safety and rights as humans are important to the researchers, then they are unlikely to put themselves forward as participants. Many of last week’s posters seemed to show a higher regard for the research than the participants. A perfect example of this came from the following blog http://saspb.wordpress.com/ “it’s very easy to loose sight of the fact that the research findings are what’s most important here and if it means deceiving someone a little or not getting their signature on a piece of paper maybe its worth it”. To saspb Just to make it clear I’m not picking on you personally. Similar remarks were made by a number of bloggers, yours just best typifies this attitude. The research is incredibly important, but without participants there is no research.
To conclude, hopefully I’ve shown the need for ethics and that they aren’t as restrictive they sometimes seem. Below I have included some links to some Milgram replications.
Links to replications of Milgram:
http://www.roddickinson.net/pages/milgram/project-synopsis.php
http://thesituationist.wordpress.com/2007/12/22/the-milgram-experiment-today/
Hello
First of all, the way you have addressed the topic of ethics with a number of interesting arguments makes this blog entry an insightful read. Before reading the ideas that you considered I had pretty much adopted a similar view point as “other bloggers” on the importance of ethics. Inevitably much more emphasis is placed upon the results and conclusions of research and whether the findings are reliable/valid etc. However, with your ideas in mind I have become more willing to consider just how important ethics can be in the implications of a study.
I agree with your idea that the importance of particular ethics depends on the nature of the study, and indeed manipulating ethics is not for the researchers benefit but for the eventual benefits towards psychological science. Your fact about the use of deception in ’50-70%’ of studies questions the usefulness of this as a specific ethical guideline. Deception in research can be a positive thing as it may reduce the risk of demand characteristics and the possibility that the participants will guess the aims of the research if they are told the true intentions of the study beforehand. Of course this is the exact reason while the percentage is so high, and if a breach of an ethical guideline can be so useful then just how restricting could it be to research to aim to adhere to them?
Of course the study by Milgram is the prime example of apparent breaching of guidelines when really everything was ethically sound. As mentioned in Fay’s lecture last week however, a further addition to your points could be that at the time of publication there was no APA until 1973 so therefore no defined APA ethical guidelines. Despite this the research was scrutinised before and after the experiment and publication but no laws or previous guidelines were broken. Linking also to your point about extreme examples influencing the publics’ view of psychology, it would appear that ethics are actually shaped by the views of society as well academics. Controversial research that attributes seemingly negative behaviour, such as the results of Milgram’s study to normal people is hard to accept as fact so it seems people look for excuses and problems with such research. The statistics you have found support this idea profoundly, as they struggle to find any ethical problems with the study.
The idea about using ethical guidelines to ensure there are participants for future research is an alternative but completely logical suggestion as to why they can be considered important. Previously I had never looked past the present ethical situation in research, but now I can see the just how essential it will be to ensure consistency of the use of certain ethics such as protection from harm and de-briefing in research. Allowing participants to understand the contribution they have made to science is a positive step towards further development of research.
Finally, I have enjoyed your alternative viewpoint on the importance of ethics as your statements were clear and backed up with relevant evidence. I particularly enjoyed the punchy conclusion about “how there is no research without participants” which sums up the whole basis of your blog entry.
Good luck for next week
Firstly, you are correct about “no participants – no research to play”. However, it is really hard to measure somth without providing natural environment to participant. To provide natural stimulus what we can see in every day world, we need to put important research findings forward. What is the point of measuring something, without actually hide some information in instructions. According to milgram study, he tried to explain why nazi behave like that “very bad” in world war two. If you have better measurement technique and if you will have such important findings, that Milgram study provide, conduct another experiment, to show that you can ethically measure same “authority obedience” effect or explain your experiment methodology.
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Obtaining consent in itself does not necessarily restrict research, I agree with that. However, some experiments such as Milgram’s study, did actually follow ethical guidelines. He used deception.. but as you said that is used in most psychology experiments anyway! The problem here is that we can only tell whether the experiment is harmful with hindsight. The reaction of participants was not expected at all. In fact, scientists and experts involved in Milgram’s study thought it was a waste of time, as no one would push any switch. Although Milgram’s study has been replicated it has never been replicated in the same way. What allowed these replications is the fact that we found out that actually it can cause harm and that the researchers were able to adapt the situation a little, (Check this out if you want to know about the hindsight bias: http://psychology.about.com/od/hindex/g/hindsight-bias.htm). So it is hard to make the distinction between what would be harmful or not, prior to running an experiment, especially if the research area is novel. You suggested the degree of dissatisfaction in participants having taken part in an experiment should be an indicator. Again, this it is hard to predict what may cause harm to an individual. Especially when looking at individuals with peculiar phobias (eg: Dextrophobia- Fear of objects at the right side of the body , Geliophobia- Fear of laughter, Leukophobia- Fear of the color white) or when hitting sensitive topics.