PSY 335 Week 2 Ethics in Research With People Example

Before the First Participant: An Ethics Review of a Student Study on Phones and Sleep

[Student Name]

University of Phoenix

PSY/335: Research Methods

Week 2 Assignment

[Instructor Name]

[Date]

The student researcher and her proposed study are composites written for a model paper; ethical standards and research findings come from the sources listed.

Sound design does not by itself protect the people who take part in a study. Ethical review asks whether participants choose freely, understand what they are agreeing to, face risks that are small and justified and are treated fairly. This paper reviews a student's proposed study on phones and sleep, identifies its ethical weak points and revises the plan.

The Proposed Study

Marisol, the composite psychology student from Week 1, wants to test whether putting a phone away an hour before bed helps college students fall asleep faster. Her first draft reads: recruit 60 students from two psychology courses where she is a teaching assistant, offer extra credit, ask participants to install an app that records all phone activity, randomly assign half to a week with no phone use after 10 p.m., measure sleep with a free tracker app and avoid telling participants the hypothesis so their expectations do not influence results.

Principles That Guide the Review

Federal guidance on research with people rests on three principles. Respect for persons means treating people as able to make their own choices and protecting those whose capacity is limited. Beneficence means minimizing risks and maximizing benefits. Justice asks that no group carry the risks of research while another collects its rewards (National Commission for the Protection of Human Subjects of Biomedical and Behavioral Research, 1979). The APA Ethics Code translates these ideas into specific standards, including those on informed consent, inducements, deception and debriefing (American Psychological Association, 2017).

A Cautionary Case

Kramer et al. (2014) altered the news feeds of roughly 689,000 users of a large social media platform for one week, reducing either the positive or the negative posts they saw, and found small shifts in the emotional tone of what users posted afterward. Users were not asked to take part; the platform relied on its general terms of service as consent. The publication drew wide criticism, and the journal later issued an editorial expression of concern about whether participants had given informed consent and been allowed to opt out. The case shows that agreeing to an app's terms is not the same as agreeing to be in an experiment, a lesson that applies directly to Marisol's plan.

Risk One: Pressure to Participate

Marisol is a teaching assistant in the courses she wants to recruit from. Students may worry that declining will affect their grades, a form of undue influence. Extra credit adds pressure if it is the only way to earn those points. The APA code requires that when research participation is a course option, students be offered an equitable alternative.

Revision: recruit through the department's research pool and a flyer, not in her own sections; offer an alternative assignment of equal time and credit, such as summarizing a journal article; keep the list of participants hidden from course instructors until grades are posted.

Risk Two: Too Much Data

An app that records all phone activity would capture which apps students open, when and for how long, revealing private information about relationships, health and habits. The study needs only total screen time in the hour before bed.

Revision: use the phone's built-in screen-time summary, with participants reporting nightly totals through a short form, so no app-by-app record is collected.

Risk Three: Consent Without Understanding

The draft gave no consent form. Under the APA code, informed consent must explain the purpose, procedures and duration, the right to decline or withdraw without penalty, foreseeable risks and benefits, limits of confidentiality, incentives and whom to contact with questions.

Revision: a plain-language form covering each element, read and signed before any data are collected, with a copy for each participant.

Tapping "I agree" on an app's terms does not mean a student agreed to be studied.

Risk Four: Withholding the Hypothesis

Not stating the hypothesis is a mild form of incomplete disclosure. The APA code allows deception only when the study has significant value, nondeceptive alternatives are not feasible and participants are told as early as possible. Here, telling students the full hypothesis could change behavior, but describing the general purpose, "how evening habits relate to sleep," is honest and sufficient.

Revision: describe the purpose in general terms, then explain the specific hypothesis and the reason for withholding it at debriefing, with the option to withdraw data.

Risk Five: Participants Under Eighteen

Some first-year students are seventeen. Minors cannot give legal consent for themselves, and including them would require parental permission and their own assent.

Revision: limit eligibility to students eighteen or older, confirmed on the screening form.

Risk Six: Hidden Harms of the Manipulation

Asking students to give up evening phone use could cause minor stress or interfere with work or family contact. Some students might rely on phones for safety or caregiving.

Revision: allow calls and urgent texts during the no-phone hour, explain that participants may stop at any time without losing credit and provide campus counseling contacts.

Data Security and Confidentiality

Sleep data and screen-time totals will be linked to participant codes, not names, with the key stored separately in an encrypted file accessible only to Marisol and her faculty supervisor. Because the link exists, the data are confidential rather than anonymous, and the consent form will say so. Data will be destroyed after a set period stated on the form.

Review and Debriefing

Because the revised study involves adults, minimal risk and no sensitive data, it would likely qualify for a lighter level of review, but only the institutional review board can decide that; researchers do not classify their own studies. After the week ends, each participant will receive a written debriefing explaining the hypothesis, how their data will be used and how to learn the results.

Conclusion

Marisol's first draft carried six ethical risks: pressure from recruiting her own students, excessive data collection, missing consent, unexplained withholding of the hypothesis, possible minors and unaddressed burdens of the manipulation. Applying the federal principles and the APA code, with the social media experiment as a warning, produced a plan that protects participants while still testing her question.

References

American Psychological Association. (2017). Ethical principles of psychologists and code of conduct (2002, amended effective June 1, 2010, and January 1, 2017). https://www.apa.org/ethics/code

Kramer, A. D. I., Guillory, J. E., & Hancock, J. T. (2014). Experimental evidence of massive-scale emotional contagion through social networks. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 111(24), 8788-8790. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1320040111

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.