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The ethics of social research. Consequentialist ethics
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THE ETHICS OF SOCIAL RESEARCH
The previous section has explored some of the political factors shaping the onto- logical and epistemological dimensions of criminological research. These are important but research methodologies and designs are not shaped by politics alone. Criminological research must also be understood within its ethical context. Ethical questions provide a further set of considerations. I argue that such considerations are much more likely to be regulated by individual conscience or professional bodies than by the State or funders/sponsors. We shall explore the ethics of criminological research in four different sections:
1. Consequentialist ethics
2. Ethical guidelines, principles and duties
3. Virtuous researchers
4. Situational and relational ethics.
Consequentialist ethics
The ‘consequentialist approach’ is based on the assumption that the ends justify the means. Thus, a criminological research project should be judged on its results and not how the findings were ascertained. If a research project provides new insights, then the authors could argue that how this knowledge was gleaned is irrelevant: the
positive consequences derived from the study mean the research should have been undertaken. There are a number of studies that have been criticized for adopting unethical research methods (Humphreys, 1970; Milgram, 1974) but here we focus on the infamous Stanford Prison Experiment (see Box 6. 6 and Box 6. 7), undertaken in the basement of Stanford University’s Jordan Hall in the summer of 1971 (Haney, 2009; Haney et al., 1973; Zimbardo, 2009).
BOX 6. 6 STANFORD PRISON EXPERIMENT 1971
In an attempt to understand how situational power relations impacted on individual identities, the social psychologists Phillip Zimbardo, Craig Haney, Curt Banks and David Jaffe created a simulated prison environment in the basement of their univer- sity psychology department; 18 men were recruited and randomly assigned to be either a prisoner or a guard in the experiment. At any one time, there were nine prisoners and three guards on duty, rotating on 8-hour shifts. The prisoners wore nylon stocking caps, ankle chains and had their prison number sewn on the back of their uniform. Within literally hours of the start of the experiment, which was originally planned for two weeks, significant behavioural changes were noted in both prisoners and guards. Perhaps overly influenced by cultural representations of prisons and prison officers in films such as Cool Hand Luke (released in 1967), a number of the guards became aggressive and abusive, effectively dehumanizing the prisoners and abusing their power in cruel and sadistic ways. Treatment of prisoners (especially those who rebelled) included being stripped naked; denial of sleep; solitary confine- ment; deprivation of meals and blankets; and being forced to do push-ups and other meaningless activities. After showing signs of depression, apathy and submissive- ness, nearly half of the prisoners had to be released after only a few days. The experiment itself was terminated on day six because of serious concerns for the safety and wellbeing of all those participating.
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Source: Haney (2009); Haney et al. (1973)
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Although the Stanford Prison Experiment had some intellectual utility (see discus- sion in Box 6. 6 and Box 6. 7), it is on shaky grounds in terms of consequentialist ethics. This is because the second dimension of consequentialist ethics is that we should look to minimize harmful consequences. In this particular study, significant harm was inflicted on the research participants. Whilst this was most notably on the prisoners, the ‘John Wayne’ prison guard also experienced trauma and depression following the experiment as he came to terms with both his notorious exploits and the reactions of others. Although a small number of similar studies have been con- ducted (see, for example, the BBC prison study The Experiment in 2002), ethical concerns have largely closed down this type of research.
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