Ethical Evaluation of a Landmark Obedience Study

In Milgram's original obedience study, what were participants deceived into believing they were doing to the confederate?

A key reason the ethical debate over the Milgram experiment is so difficult to resolve is that the risks (severe psychological harm) were borne by the participants, while the benefits (insights into destructive obedience) accrued primarily to society—meaning the costs and gains did not fall on the same people.

Match each research ethics concept to the specific way it was present in Milgram's obedience study.

Evaluating the ethical balance of Milgram's study requires analyzing the distribution of study outcomes, where the severe psychological stress was borne by the _____ while the resulting scientific knowledge primarily benefited society.

Order the phases of the Milgram experiment from the initial exposure to research risk through the mitigation steps designed to address the ethical balance of the study.

An institutional review board (IRB) is evaluating a proposed study on obedience. In this study, participants will be led to believe they are causing mild distress to another person, which is expected to cause the participants significant temporary anxiety. The researcher argues that this psychological discomfort is justified because the study will yield critical insights into how authority figures influence group behavior. This conflict highlights which core ethical challenge of research design?