4. Why Is Deception Sometimes Used In Psycho-Logical Research?

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Chapter Review Questions

1) Describe the basic purpose of IRBs and the reasons research psychologists have criticized them.
a. Institutional review boards (IRBs) were put in to place to assure the health and safety of all research participants and to make sure all research is being conducted to the APA’s standard of ethics. Since people without specialties are required to be one each panel it is often times argued that many propels are denied because these boards may fail to get the merit of the work due to a lack of understanding the material. People also argue that the boards may not be focused enough on psychological studies and based in the medical field. This requires the researchers to add irrelevant content to their studies. IRB’s …show more content…

How can the use of deception be reconciled with the concept of informed consent?

a. Deception may be used in the event that they data cannot collected in any other way without the participants tainting by behaving unnaturally.

Example: A study is conducted on the bystander effect. Several people are put into a room where they are asked to answer a questionnaire about their participation in campus events. In the next a person “falls” from the top of a ladder and are calling for help. The researchers then record how long it takes for one of the participants to respond to the person in the other room. This is an example of deception. If the participants knew they were being tested on the bystander effect they would have responded much quicker and thus tainting the data.

4) Describe the two main purposes of a debrief-ing session. When might a full debriefing be delayed until the experiment is completed?

a. Dehoaxing: Reveal to the participant the theory and purpose of the research. Except in cases where deception is used. In this case information is offered when the research has been completed.
b. Desensitizing: Provide participants with care to reinstate them to their previous state of …show more content…

From the stand-point of the APA’s code of ethics, which components could cause problems with an IRB? Explain how you might defend each study to an IRB.

In a field experiment, a woman (who was actu-ally part of the experiment) stood by her car on the side of a road. The car had a flat tire. To determine if modeling would affect the helping behavior of passing motorists, on some trials another woman with a flat tire was helped by a stopped motorist (all part of the staged event) about a quarter-mile before the place where the woman waited for help. As expected, motorists were more likely to stop and help if they had just witnessed another person helping (Bryan & Test, 1967).

a. Some of the problems that the IRB may have with this experiments is the fact that the participants are not giving informed consent and they are technically in danger if they get out of their car to help on the side of a freeway. They may also find conflict with the fact that there are conductors coming in direct contact with the subject by being part of the experiment itself. However, since deception is being used one could argue that debriefing may answer any questions the participants have after the study is over and if the road is controlled the risks of the participants is minimized. One could also argue that the experiment could not be conducted without placing a plant where the experimenter wasn’t directly

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