Ethical Issues

Protection of participants:

Psychologists must ensure that no physical or mental harm is done to the participants during the research and that they leave the study i the same state they entered it.

Informed consent:

Participants must be informed about the nature of the study and agree to participate. However, researchers may decide not to give the full aims of the study in order to reduce demand characteristics.

Right to withdraw:

Participants should be informed that they have the right to leave the study at any time and withdraw their data if they wish.

Confidentiality:

Researchers must tell participants that all the information gathered will not be identifiable as their own and all data will pooled when analysed. Examples of this could be age and name.

Deception:

Participants should not be hidden the aspects of the study unless the research would be useless due to demand characteristics. Any deception should be justified to participants at the end of the study.

Debriefing: 

Researchers must reveal and explain the true aims and purpose of the research to the participants at the end of the study. Also, they should ask any questions participants have and check they still want their data used.