Guéguen and de Gail Field Experiment

Under which of the following conditions might an Institutional Review Board (IRB) allow a researcher to dispense with obtaining informed consent?

Researchers are strictly prohibited from conducting any psychological study without first obtaining informed consent from all participants.

Match each proposed research scenario with the most appropriate Institutional Review Board (IRB) guideline regarding informed consent.

A researcher plans to observe how strangers react to a staged minor mishap in a public park to study prosocial behavior. Arrange the following criteria in the logical order that an Institutional Review Board (IRB) would analyze them to determine if the researcher can dispense with informed consent, moving from the situational context to the final safety determination.

A social psychologist is designing an unrecruited field experiment to observe how environmental factors influence altruistic behavior in a public park. Construct the logical progression of the researcher's protocol-design process to synthesize a valid justification for a waiver of the standard participant agreement process.

Which of the following research methods is most likely to be permitted by an Institutional Review Board (IRB) to dispense with obtaining informed consent?

Match each core concept related to ethical research conduct with the specific role it plays in determining whether informed consent can be waived.

A researcher proposes an unrecruited field experiment to observe prosocial behavior by having a confederate drop groceries in a busy shopping mall. To evaluate whether this study qualifies for a waiver of informed consent, an Institutional Review Board (IRB) must determine that the procedure occurs during the participants' ordinary, everyday activities and is not expected to cause any _____.

A professor teaching two sections of the same introductory psychology course decides to compare two legitimate instructional approaches: one section completes weekly paper-based quizzes while the other uses an online quiz platform. She measures exam performance at the end of the semester without obtaining signed informed consent from her students. True or False: When analyzed against the two key conditions IRBs apply under APA Standard 8.05, this study most likely qualifies for dispensing with informed consent because it compares legitimate pedagogical methods within students' ordinary academic activities and poses no anticipated harm.

A researcher designs an unrecruited field experiment in which a confederate accidentally drops a folder of papers near the entrance of a busy campus cafeteria while an observer records whether nearby strangers stop to help retrieve them. The researcher argues that no informed consent is needed. When an IRB evaluates this waiver request, the critical judgment it must make—beyond confirming there is no anticipated harm—is whether a staged mishap of this kind falls within events that people typically encounter during their _____ activities.

Based on Institutional Review Board (IRB) and APA Ethics Code guidelines, recall and describe the specific conditions under which researchers are permitted to dispense with obtaining informed consent from participants in a psychological study.

Given this scenario, demonstrate your comprehension of ethical guidelines by explaining why an Institutional Review Board (IRB) would likely allow the researcher to dispense with informed consent.

Apply ethical guidelines to the following scenario: A college instructor wants to compare two legitimate teaching methods across two sections of his research methods course. Decide whether the instructor needs to obtain informed consent from the students, and justify your decision in one to three sentences.