AS Issues and Debates
Nature vs. Nurture
Nature refers to how biological factors (e.g. hormones and genetics) affect behavior
Nurture refers to how external factors (e.g. experiences and upbringing) affect behavior
Individual vs. Situational
Individual factors refer to how factors within a person affect behavior
Situational factors refer to how factors in the external environment affect behavior
Use of children in psychological research
Children are sometimes used to study their development and behavior, or to tailor interventions to children’s needs. For instance, Saavedra and Silverman investigated button phobia in a 9-year-old child. While this provides insight into their thoughts, behavior, feelings, and development, ethics need to be upheld to prevent any psychological harm (protection from harm), and there are also limitations to using children as participants in a study (e.g. they may be too young to understand how to do a complex task).
Use of animals in psychological research
There are ethics that must be followed when carrying out a study using animals:
1. Minimize harm, maximize benefit
2. Replacement (consider replacing animal experiments with computer simulations/videos of studies)
3. Species (choose the species that is least likely to suffer pain/distress, or has less sentience/consider if the species has been bred in captivity or in the wild)
4. Number (use the minimum number of animals to produce valid and reliable results; use pilot studies before carrying out the actual study)
5. Procedures
→ pain, suffering, distress (physiological + psychological should be avoided; pay attention to daily care and veterinary needs)
→ housing (no overcrowding/isolation, enough space to move freely, water + food, balance cleanliness and stress, biological + ecological needs)
→ reward, deprivation, adversive stimuli (consider animal’s normal eating and drinking habits and its metabolic requirements; rewards (e.g. fav food) > punishment!)
Application to daily life
For all case studies, consider what real world application the results or conclusions have to daily life. Should changes be made? Can tests be used?