Zusammenfassung der Ressource
AQA Psychology
- Ethical Issues
- Deception
- Viewed as unethical because it can lead to
participants taking part in something they
don't want to do.
- Can lead to people being
reluctant to take part in
psychological studies because
psychologists are
untrustworthy
- Informed consent
cannot be gained
- It is sometimes necessary to hide the true aims
of the study to avoid demand characteristics so
natural behaviour can be observed
- If deception is used, a full debrief
should be carried out, retrospective
informed consent should be gained and
the right to withdraw emphasized
- Right to Withdraw
- Participants may need to
withdraw if they feel distressed
or want to withdraw their data
if they do not agree with the
aims of the study
- This may lead to biased
findings if a lot of a certain
type of data is withdrawn
- The right to withdraw should be
offered to all participants, even
if only until the data is published
- Informed Consent
- Participants may feel that they should be told
the aims and procedure of the study so that
they can decide whether to participate or not
- This was made a basic
human right after the
Nuremburg war trials
- This could lead to demand
characteristics, lowering
the internal validity
- Researchers may not
be able to accurately
predict risks.
- Protection from harm
- Without being protected from
harm, people would be reluctant to
participate in psychological studies
- Some important questions
cannot be answered without
causing some distress
- Harm-free experiments can
be hard to guarantee due to
individual differences
- A participant should be
exposed to no greater harm
than they would be in real
life.
- Harm can be psychological or
physical so the participant
must leave in the same state
they were in before
- Confidentiality
- The Data Protection Act makes
confidentiality a legal requirement
- Without confidentiality, people
may be reluctant to participate
in psychological studies
- It can be hard to guarantee confidentiality
because participants may be identified by their
answers, but anonymity can be guarentreed
- Invasion of Privacy
- It can be hard to avoid invasion of
privacy when observing people without
their knowledge
- Participants may disagree to
being observed in certain places
- Researchers can only observe people
without their knowledge in public
places
- Animal Rights
- It may not be possible to answer biological
psychology questions on humans due to
protection from harm rules
- Some people believe that
animals should have the same
protection from harm as humans
- Without animal rights, researchers
may find it hard to find animals to use