This document discusses some of the ethical issues that can arise in psychological experiments involving human participants. It notes that researchers must ensure participants are not harmed and that informed consent and the right to withdraw are important principles. However, fully informing participants about experimental aims can interfere with controls. The document explores how to gain informed consent while maintaining experimental integrity. It also discusses how the Milgram obedience study exemplified unethical practices and how to evaluate experiments' strengths and weaknesses.

2. How do you feel every time I say
that you are going to do an
experiment?
 When you went in the office
 When you did the word search experiment
Everyone feels a bit like this and researchers must
make sure their participants are not harmed
Possible problems are ethical issues

3. But….
 Ethics can clash with experimental controls
 We need to explain to participants what they are
about to agree to do
 But sometimes we don’t want to let them know what
the real aim of the study is
 Can you think of an experiment where this might be
the case?

4. Ethical issues
 Informed consent
 Right to withdraw

5. Informed consent
 Participants should know what they are about to do
 WHY….imagine volunteering for an experiment on
phobias and being shown spiders if you hate them!
 Participants might want to know:
1. If they are in competition with others
2. What the results are going to be used for

6. Right to withdraw
 Participants should not feel that they have to carry
on
 ….even if they are being paid!
 Imagine how you would feel if you felt you did badly
in an experiment, would you want to do the second
condition?

7. Ethical Guidelines
 The British Psychological Society (BPS) give
suggestions (guidelines) for psychologist to deal with
the ethical issues
See the BPS Code of Ethics and Conduct (2006) p. 45

8. How can you solve these ethical
issues? Discuss with a partner
 Gaining informed consent
 Doing a study where there are lots of people in a
park and you could not possibly ask them all to
consent
 Someone feel trapped in an experiment and unable
to leave

9. Solving ethical problems
 Informed consent can be got by giving participants a
summary of what is about to happen in a study
 They can then chose whether to take part
 If a study is in a public place like a park, researchers
can ask colleagues whether they think people would
mind
 Participants might feel trapped in a laboratory
situation so the researcher should tell them at the
start that they can leave at any time

10. You are about to watch a clip of
a psychological experiment that
has now become infamous for
it unethical approach

11. Milgram Obedience Study

12. You need to write down any ethical
issues that arise from this study

13. Evaluating Experiments
Strengths v Weaknesses

14. Strengths of Experiments
Only the Independent variable affects the
Dependent Variable
 The experimenter sets up the different conditions of
the IV and controls all other variables
 They can be sure that any changes in the DV are
caused by the IV

15. Strengths of Experiments
Measuring the Dependent Variable accurately
 This can be measured accurately (e.g. in
milliseconds, or the number of items recalled etc.)

16. Strengths of Experiments
Controls
 In Palmers experiment participants were only
allowed to look at the scene for a short amount of
time
 Each participant saw the scene for the same amount
of time
 You can then be more sure that it was the category
of object (appropriate object or inappropriate similar
object) that caused the object to be identified or not

17. Strengths of Experiments
Informed consent
 In a laboratory experiment participants can be told
what will happen
 This is ethically good
 But, they usually cannot be told why they are doing
something as they would change how they behave
and alter the results

18. Strengths of Experiments
Right to withdraw
 Participants can be told about the right to withdraw
when they go into an experiment
 This cannot be done in a more real-life setting where
the participants do not know they are in a study

19. Activity
 In pairs you are going to design the most unethical
study ever
 You must not say what the ethical issues are
 You will swap your study with another pair and see if
you can see what the ethical issues are in their study

20. Weaknesses of Experiments
Representing real life
 Experiments are often set in laboratories and do not
represent real life
 This is an unfamiliar situation so the participant
might behave different to normal
 The tests in the experiment can be unlike real life
 How often do you find mail boxes in kitchens?
(Palmer)
 This means the findings might not tell us how people
behave in the real world

21. Weaknesses of Experiments
Hiding the experimental aims
 Knowing the aim of a study might alter the way a
participant might behave
 How would this have affected Bartlett’s War of the
Ghosts experiment?

22. Weaknesses of Experiments
Deception
An example: Imagine you have decided to take part in
a study you believe is about guilt and innocense. You
find examples of crime distressing but you take part
because you feel that it is important. How would you
feel if you later find out that it is just a memory test?

23. Weaknesses of Experiments
Deception
 Sometimes deception does need to be used but
harm can be minimised by:
1. Avoiding deception unless it is really necessary
2. Avoiding other ethical problems such as
embarrassment
3. Explaining the real purpose as soon as possible
4. Allowing them to withdraw at any time