Methods of Psych - Chapter 4

The Three R's: Refinement

Procedures should minimize animal distress.

A local committee that reviews research that is conducted on animals is known as

an IACUC

True or false? Research on human participants conducted by a university must be approved by an institutional review board.

True

The Three R's: Replacement

Research should find alternatives to using animals

What must a researcher do when using deception in an experiment?

debrief the participants afterward

Data falsification

A researcher alters the data they collected.

Plagiarism

A researcher attempts to pass off the ideas of others as their own.

Self-plagiarism

A researcher copies a sentence from the Method section of a paper they published a year ago and pastes it into their new paper's introduction.

True or False? Tuskegee Syphilis Study: At the end of the study, the researchers informed participants about penicillin, which was an effective treatment for syphilis.

False

True or False? Tuskegee Syphilis Study: The researchers fully informed participants about the purpose, risks, and benefits of the study.

False

True or false? Most IRBs will not approve controversial research, even if participants are not at risk.

False

True or false? Research participants must always sign an informed consent form.

False

What is an alternative hypothesis?

It is an alternative, plausible outcome to the outcome predicted by the author(s)

Why is it unethical to provide an incentive that is too large to refuse (for example, offering undergraduate students free tuition for a semester for participating in a study)?

It unduly influences people into participating

Why is plagiarism a violation of ethics?

It violates an APA standard.

Which of the following ethical violations proposed by the Belmont Report was NOT committed in the Tuskegee Study?

Participants were not given monetary payments for their time.

Your professor says that researchers do not make ethical decisions alone. What does this mean?

Researchers must consider the opinions of others, including institutional review board (IRB) members and peers.

Justice (Belmont Report principle)

Researchers must recruit participants who are representative of the population that would benefit from the results of the study.

Respect for persons (belmont principle)

Researchers should take care to study only participants who are able to understand the procedures, risks, and benefits of the study.

Which of the following is a primary reason that psychologists might fabricate or falsify their data?

They feel pressure to publish findings.

Respect for persons (belmont principle) 2

To avoid undue influence, researchers should carefully consider whether the compensation is appropriate for the participants they are recruiting.

Which statement would an animal researcher most likely agree with?

wait for correct answer to be posted

RESEARCH STUDY 4.1: Dr. Kushner is planning on conducting a study next semester. He is curious as to whether sleep deprivation is associated with poorer cognitive performance. For example, if you sleep poorly the night before a big exam, will you do worse? Dr. Kushner is especially curious about selective sleep deprivation, where people are kept from entering REM (rapid eye movement) sleep. Using an electroencephalograph (EEG) to monitor brain waves, he plans to let participants sleep until they enter REM sleep and then wake them. After the participants are awake for one minute, Dr. Kushner plans to let them return to sleep. As they enter REM sleep again, he will wake them again and follow the same procedure. He plans to do this through the entire eight-hour sleep session. The following morning, participants will be asked to take a sample SAT test. Upon receiving institutional review board (IRB) approval, Dr. Kushner trusts that his graduate student will conduct the study. However, his graduate student does not conduct the study and instead provides Dr. Kushner with invented results that support his hypotheses. This is known as which of the following?

data fabrication

Data fabrication and falsification go against Merton's scientific norm of ______________, while open data upholds Merton's scientific norm of _________________

disinterestedness; communality

When conducting animal research, which guideline states that alternatives to animal research should be considered?

replacement

The issue of obtaining informed consent deals with which of the following principles of the Belmont Report?

the principle of respect for persons

Ethical decision making is

wait for correct answer to be posted

What was the primary ethical concern in the Milgram study?

wait for correct answer to be posted

Which of the following ethical violations did NOT occur in the Tuskegee Study?

wait for correct answer to be posted

beneficence (Belmont Report principle) 2

The researcher must give the control group the opportunity to receive a new treatment if and when the study has found it to be effective.

True or False? Tuskegee Syphilis Study: The study harmed not just the participants, but even their families and careers.

True

The Three R's: Reduction

Procedures should use the smallest possible number of animal subjects.

beneficence (Belmont Report principle)

To prevent sensitive participant data from being revealed, researchers should not collect any potentially identifying information.

In considering whether research is ethical, which of the following are balanced against each other?

risk to participants versus value of the knowledge gained

data fabrication

A researcher creates fake data, meaning the data were not produced from a study.

True or false? Researchers are never permitted to deceive their participants.

False

Justice (Belmont Report principle) 2

To study a sample of participants from only one ethnic group, researchers must first demonstrate that the problem being studied is especially prevalent in that ethnic group.

True or False? Tuskegee Syphilis Study: The researchers lied to participants about a dangerous diagnostic procedure, calling it a "special free treatment."

True

RESEARCH STUDY 4.1: Dr. Kushner is planning on conducting a study next semester. He is curious as to whether sleep deprivation is associated with poorer cognitive performance. For example, if you sleep poorly the night before a big exam, will you do worse? Dr. Kushner is especially curious about selective sleep deprivation, where people are kept from entering REM (rapid eye movement) sleep. Using an electroencephalograph (EEG) to monitor brain waves, he plans to let participants sleep until they enter REM sleep and then wake them. After the participants are awake for one minute, Dr. Kushner plans to let them return to sleep. As they enter REM sleep again, he will wake them again and follow the same procedure. He plans to do this through the entire eight-hour sleep session. The following morning, participants will be asked to take a sample SAT test. To address the Belmont principle of beneficence, Dr. Kushner would need to ask which of the following questions?

What can I do to decrease the potential harm experienced by my participants?

RESEARCH STUDY 4.1: Dr. Kushner is planning on conducting a study next semester. He is curious as to whether sleep deprivation is associated with poorer cognitive performance. For example, if you sleep poorly the night before a big exam, will you do worse? Dr. Kushner is especially curious about selective sleep deprivation, where people are kept from entering REM (rapid eye movement) sleep. Using an electroencephalograph (EEG) to monitor brain waves, he plans to let participants sleep until they enter REM sleep and then wake them. After the participants are awake for one minute, Dr. Kushner plans to let them return to sleep. As they enter REM sleep again, he will wake them again and follow the same procedure. He plans to do this through the entire eight-hour sleep session. The following morning, participants will be asked to take a sample SAT test. Dr. Kushner is deciding whether he needs to give participants a reason for waking them up several times during the night. He knows that he cannot tell them the real reason, but he is unsure whether he should deceive them (give them a false reason why he is waking them up) or provide them with no cover story at all. Which of the following issues should be considered most heavily when deciding whether to use deception?

whether he can conduct the study just as well without deception