3  Ethics in Psychological Research

3.1 Introduction

These lecture notes on ethics in psychological research focus primarily on the APA’s ethics code (2017). Although the APA does strive to have an international presence, other countries may have specific laws and/or regulations about the praxis of psychological research. Therefore, if you want to work outside of the USA, you may need to supplement your knowledge beyond these lecture notes.

Also, the final semester of this degree program includes a course that will focus on ethics in IWO psychology. At that point, we will do a deeper dive into ethics related to psychological research and praxis. For now, we are merely introducing you to fundamental ideas that would be good for you to know now. As you likely know by now, repeated exposure is very beneficial for your long-term retention of information.

3.2 A brief USA history on ethics in psychological research

Since before recorded history, researchers have been doing research on humans—also known as research on human subjects or human subjects research.

If you look at the history of ethics in psychological research in the USA, you can see a clear trend toward greater and greater respect for the wellbeing of the research participants, but it’s taken many years for the professional ethical standards of psychologists to get to where they are today.

As you might already be familiar with, there are many examples of early research in the 1960s and 1970s that would not be allowed by today’s professional ethical standards for psychologists. Notable examples include the Tuskegee Syphilis Study from the 1930s thru 1970s, Stanley Milgram’s electric shock studies of the 1960s, and Philip Zimbardo’s Stanford Prison Experiment in 1971. Surprisingly, these studies occurred even though the first version of the APA’s Ethics Code had already been published in 1953.

Most students of psychology learn about a historically significant milestone known as the Belmont Report. The Belmont Report (1979) was a document that was officially published in 1979 by the U.S. National Commission for the Protection of Human Subjects of Biomedical and Behavioral Research. It was created as a response to controversial and ethical problems about the Tuskegee Syphilis Study. One of the major problems with the Tuskegee Syphilis Study was that the researchers were studying the effects of syphilis on adults, but the researchers weren’t informing the participants there was already a widely available and standard treatment for syphilis since 1947 (which was the antibiotic named penicillin). Thus, the researchers allowed the participants and their families to suffer with syphilis without proper treatment.

Although that research was conducted by biomedical professionals (not psychologists), I’m mentioning all of this because it was a major historic event that eventually caused the production of the Belmont Report which was one of the first widely-known reports that established the need for a formal ethical system to guide the manner of conducting a research study. Importantly, the Belmont Report highlighted three ethical principles:

1. respect for persons;
2. beneficence;
3. justice.

Although the first edition of the APA’s ethics code was published in 1953, it didn’t receive nearly as much attention as the Belmont Report. However, today arguably every researcher of psychology is familiar with many of the ethical standards in the APA ethics code.

3.3 The APA Ethics Code

The current version of the APA ethics code (2017) is formally titled the Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct—but many people shorten it to the APA ethics code. It has been updated over the years, and the most recent major revision was in 2002, followed by minor amendments in 2010 and 2016.

The APA ethics code applies to anyone who identifies as a professional in psychology, by virtue of the activities the person performs. The APA ethics code doesn’t explicitly define who is a psychologist, but rather it is implicitly defined via examples of the types of activities that a professional in psychology typically performs. Also, the Introduction section of the APA ethics code states: “Membership in the APA commits members and student affiliates to comply with the standards of the APA Ethics”.

The APA ethics code formally recognizes five General Principles:

1. beneficence and nonmaleficence
2. fidelity and responsibility
3. integrity
4. justice
5. respect for people’s rights and dignity

The APA ethics code is organized into 10 sections that contain the enforceable obligations for psychologists. You will learn about those 10 sections in a later course in this degree program, but for now we will introduce you some of the important concepts in Section 8: Research and Publication.

3.3.1 Informed Consent to Research

According to the APA ethics code, psychologists who wish to do any of a variety of activities—such as assessments, consulting, counseling, research, and/or therapy—must receive informed consent from prospective participants and/or clients (though there are a few exceptions where informed consent isn’t required, such as when a law or court order requires the psychologists to do something). Informed consent is permission that the participant gives to the psychologist, after the participant is well-informed about what they’re consenting to.

According to standard 8.02(a) of the APA ethics code (2017), if the psychologist wants to recruit a potential participant for a research study, the psychologist must provide all of the following information to the potential participant so that the potential participant can give informed consent:

1. the purpose of the research, expected duration, and procedures;
2. their right to decline to participate and to withdraw from the research after participation has begun;
3. the foreseeable consequences of declining or withdrawing;
4. reasonably foreseeable factors that may be expected to influence their willingness to participate, such as potential risks, discomfort, or adverse effects;
5. any prospective research benefits;
6. limits of confidentiality;
7. incentives for participation;
8. whom to contact for questions about the research and the research participant’s rights.

Additionally, during the informed consent process, the psychologist must provide the opportunity for the potential participant to ask questions and receive answers.

3.3.2 Deception in research

In the context of human-subjects research, deception is the process or result of misleading a research participant, especially for a purpose that is useful for the goals of the study.

According to standard 8.07 of the APA ethics code (2017), psychologists are allowed to use deception in a research study, but only when the situation meets ALL of these criteria:

• the use of the deception is justified by the study’s significant prospective scientific, educational, or applied value, AND effective nondeceptive alternative procedures are not feasible, AND the study is reasonably expected to NOT cause physical pain or severe emotional distress.

Psychologists are never allowed to use deception in a research study if the research activity “is reasonably expected to cause physical pain or severe emotional distress.”

If a psychologist does use deception in a research study, they must eventually reveal the deception to the participants who were deceived—this is known as debriefing. Specifically, “they explain any deception that is an integral feature of the design and conduct of an experiment to participants as early as is feasible, preferably at the conclusion of their participation, but no later than at the conclusion of the data collection” (American Psychological Association, 2017, standard 8.07).

3.3.3 Informed Consent for Recording Video, Audio, and/or Photos

According to standard 8.03 of the APA ethics code (2017), prior to recording audio or video of a research participant (e.g., for data-collection) the psychologist must obtain the informed consent from the participant (or a legally authorized person) to record them. However, the following two situations are allowed to be exceptions:

• The data-collection is targeted only toward naturalistic observations in public places, AND the researcher expects the recordings will only be used in a manner that doesn’t cause the people to be personally identified nor harmed.
• The research design includes deception, AND the consent for the use of the recording is obtained during debriefing.

3.4 IRB in research on human-subjects

IRB is an acronym for Institutional Review Board. An IRB is a committee that reviews, approves, and monitors research. One of the main goals of IRBs is to protect the rights, welfare, and privacy of human-subjects in research. In the USA, it’s probably safe to assume every university has an IRB that is part of that university. There are also IRBs that are part of government agencies, and also commercially private IRBs that provide services for researchers who aren’t affiliated with any institution that already has an internal IRB.

If you are a student at a university and you wish to do research on human-subjects, you almost always need to get approval from your university’s IRB first (many universities grant exceptions, such as when the research is for a class project led by an instructor). The approval process involves sending to the IRB a report that describes your proposed research (often, researchers call that report “the IRB” or “the IRB paperwork”, e.g., “Did you do the IRB?”).

There are many nuanced rules about what types of research can be quickly approved by your university’s IRB, but that is beyond the scope of this course. For now, I just want you to know what an IRB is and why they exist.

3.5 Suggested Readings

If you want to learn more, the APA ethics code is actually a short read. If you’re mostly curious about its ethical standards about research, you could skip to Section 8: Research and Publication. You can find the APA ethics code easily on the APA’s website, and I’ve also placed a copy of the PDF version into our Zotero Group Library.

References

American Psychological Association. (2017). Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct (2002, amended 2010, 2016; effective January 1, 2017). American Psychological Association. https://www.apa.org/ethics/code/ethics-code-2017.pdf

National Commission for the Protection of Human Subjects of Biomedical and Behavioral Research. (1979). The Belmont Report: Ethical Principles and Guidelines for the Protection of Human Subjects of Research. U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare.