An Analysis of Ethical Dilemmas Encountered in Psychological Research
Researchers are ethically obligated to prevent harm from falling upon participants while obtaining information. Milgram and Zimbardo classical experiments are examples of how researchers have and are prone to fail to protect participants if they are not careful. Deception is also a major ethical concern especially when information is withheld from participants of experiments. Young children who are involved in research are vulnerable and should be protected from danger. Psychological researchers should come up with safer and more ethically sound ways of conducting their studies.
Haslam and Reicher (2012) analysis of the experiments and related studies of Milgram and Zimbardo reveal major ethical pitfalls that past researchers have fallen into and future researchers if not careful are prone to fall into. Milgram experiment revealed that earlier and participants were willing to bend the rules as long as this was endorsed by someone in authority (Haslam & Reicher, 2012). The researcher was also responsible for withholding information to participants and even deliberately misdirecting the participants, both the ‘teacher’ and the ‘student’ with the teacher being told that hurting fellow humans was alright if the end justified the means. On the other hand, the student was shown it was acceptable to deceive the other participants. In Zimbardo’s prison experiment researchers were willing to allow bodily and other forms of harms to fall upon their participants as long as some good in the form of the progress of knowledge would be the overall result. Researchers need to come up with ways of carrying out research ethically which entails allowing participants to fully understand what they are signing up for.
The classic experiment performed by Asch on conformity also raises similar ethical issues. Is it ethically sound to mislead participants of an experiment? In this classic experiment, confederates were used to mislead participants by unanimously giving the incorrect answers so the researcher could meet the objectives of the experiment which was to determine whether or not people conformed to the opinion of the majority even when these opinions were incorrect. In some experiments, researchers have been known to administer innocuous and inert medication to participants who unwittingly believe they are undergoing treatment for an infection. This practice is a modern variation of the classic experiments that would be widely criticized today and yet to some extent are seen as acceptable research ethical standards. Researchers need to be careful to identify where to draw the line. For example, the participants have the right to be informed beforehand that some of the aspects of their participation will include being provided with misleading information.
Mischel (et al. 1960) performed a series of experiments with participants who were preschoolers. The major ethical issue raised by these experiment involves the harm that may have resulted to the participants for taking part in an experiment while very young. Very young children such as preschoolers are not capable of being responsible for consenting to participate in the experiments and have to rely on their care providers for protection (Mischel, Ayduk, Berman, Casey, Gotlib, Jonides & ... Shoda, 2011). Also, the reliability and validity obtained from young participants can be questioned on the grounds of bias from parents who may be prone to influence their young ones to conform to what they believe will be the best decision in this case delayed gratification. Examination of these experiments reveals the need to create a comprehensive framework to guide various research practices on ethical dilemmas that are often encountered during research.
The research process is encumbered by many ethical dilemmas. Researchers should be careful about the difficult decisions they make that might necessitate violating the rights of participants in the name of increasing knowledge. Researchers are generally ethically obligated to obtain the consent of the participants of the experiments they conduct (Larsen, 1974). However, when these participants have to be misdirected for the objectives of the experiment to be met it becomes difficult to meet this expectation. Underage participants are also vulnerable to exploitation and possible harm from unanticipated consequences of participating in experimental studies. Researchers should come up with guidelines on how to navigate these issues.
References
Haslam, S. A., & Reicher, S. D. (2012). Contesting the ′nature′ of conformity: What Milgram and Zimbardo′s studies really show. Plos Biology, 10(11), doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.1001426
Larsen, K. S. (1974). Conformity in the Asch experiment. The Journal Of Social Psychology, 94(2), 303-304. doi:10.1080/00224545.1974.9923224
Mischel, W., Ayduk, O., Berman, M. G., Casey, B. J., Gotlib, I. H., Jonides, J., & ... Shoda, Y. (2011). ′Willpower′ over the life span: Decomposing self-regulation. Social Cognitive And Affective Neuroscience, 6(2), 252-256. doi:10.1093/scan/nsq081
