SOAN 2120 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Milgram Experiment, Participant Observation, Silver Standard

• School: University of Guelph
• Department: Sociology and Anthropology
• Course: SOAN 2120
• Professor: D Walters

Document Summary

Ethics in social experiments the milgram experiments on obedience particularly bear implications on ethics in experimental designs. Researchers can invade privacy in a variety of ways: sensitive questions on surveys (values, beliefs, backgrounds, observation without their knowledge. Researchers need informed consent in order to conduct the research: researchers argue that sometimes it is necessary to deceive the participants in order to capture their true behaviour. Anonymity (gold standard) the people in the study are anonymous and cannot be identified (the researcher does not even have information that could reveal their identity) Confidentiality (silver standard) the researcher knows their identity but does not disclose it. In independent research, the researcher must do a cost-benefit analysis of morality vs. knowledge; often, though, this research is subsidized by institutions and is then under their control, under which they conservatively exercise legal and moral consideration.