An ethics committee is reviewing a proposed study involving 14-year-old pupils. Each pupil would give a five-minute speech about their biggest personal weakness to six unfamiliar adults.
A pilot study with 12 pupils produced the following results. Pupils rated their distress from 0 (not distressed) to 10 (extremely distressed).
| Time of rating | Mean distress rating |
|---|---|
| Before the speech | 2.8 |
| Immediately after the speech | 7.1 |
| 30 minutes after the speech | 5.6 |
Using the pilot data, explain why the proposed procedure may not adequately protect participants from psychological harm.
182 exam-style questions on OCR GCSE Psychology 7.1 Planning Research, covering 7.1.1 Hypotheses, 7.1.2 Variables, 7.1.3 Experimental Designs, 7.1.4 Populations and Sampling, 7.1.5 Ethical issues, and 7.1.6 Dealing with ethical issues and BPS Code. Each one has a worked solution and a mark scheme showing where the marks go.