Short Answer

Imagine you are an ethics board member reviewing a new proposal that plans to secretly observe people in a public setting where privacy is expected. If the researcher attempts to use the exact same procedural defense as Middlemist and colleagues used in their 1976 study, what specific action would the researcher propose doing prior to the main observation to justify the study?

Question: Imagine you are an ethics board member reviewing a new proposal that plans to secretly observe people in a public setting where privacy is expected. If the researcher attempts to use the exact same procedural defense as Middlemist and colleagues used in their 1976 study, what specific action would the researcher propose doing prior to the main observation to justify the study?

Sample answer: The researcher would propose conducting preliminary interviews to demonstrate that potential participants would not be bothered by the secret observation, and argue that they carefully weighed the tradeoffs.

Key points:

  • Conducting preliminary interviews.
  • Using these interviews to show participants are not bothered by the observation.
  • Asserting that the researchers carefully weighed the tradeoffs of conducting the study.

Feedback: The correct answer must identify the use of preliminary interviews to check if participants are bothered, as well as the weighing of tradeoffs, mirroring the defense used in the Middlemist study.

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Updated 2026-05-27

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Research Methods in Psychology - 4th American Edition @ KPU

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