Mrs Doubtfire’s Deception

 Another movie?… well research methods & Stats can be applied anywhere … right?

WARNING: This blog  is  longish, I have included examples & antidotes for amusements, if this isn’t for you, just avoid the BOLD font, and all will go swimmingly. 

Hello Readers,

So i am once again relating psychology to one of my favorite movies… but I swear its relevant… just go along with it…

Last night I watched the film “Just Go With It”, if you know this Adam Sandler flick, you will know it is wonderfully corny and in no way educational. But how has this brought me to my blog? … Well… the premise of the film is the characters make up lies to impress other characters, and these lies escalate and they are forced to  just go along with it… LIGHT BULB… lies are a natural part of human interaction (Men lie 6 times a day, and women lie 3 times, but what if they are fibbing?), So if the majority of humans lie, how can we expect honesty from psychologists especially as participants are under no contract of truthfulness?

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Ok, so why do psychologists lie/deceive?

Here is where Mrs Doubtfire comes in.

Daniel Hillard (Robin Willaims) is a divorced man who  wants to be part of his kids lives but his ex-wife & the court is unwilling for him to be involved. If he were to walk in to the house his ex would be disgruntled and unamused. BUT… Daniel became Mrs Euphegenia Doubtfire, a woman lovable in every way, who both his ex and the children grow to love. This ‘deception’ aloud any preconceived idea of Daniel to not be a contributing variable of  Daniels relationship with his family.

What Mrs Doubtfire can tell us a bout research methods is that participants can have expectations that will taint our results, but with tiny pinch of deception and dash of misleading information, preconceived ideas and expectations can be removed as a confounding variable, allowing the results to be natural, valid & reliable.

Now.. lets be academic for a second, lets look at the evidence. Do peoples knowledge on a subject really matter?

Preconceived ideas about the nature of an experiment can bias the results. Even if the preconceived ideas don’t seem obviously disruptive to the integrity of the experiment, it can still cause major experimental flaws, for example Jason Elliot tested the effectiveness of virtual-reality in education, children were in either a virtual reality or a text book condition. The children who participated in the VR  condition were excited and enthusiastic… until they were presented with the VR that failed to meet there expectations.  As a Result the children were disappointed  and they contributed very little effort . These children demonstrated less independant learning as the VR was not a video game like they had hoped… The children’s irrelevant performance provided no applied value. The introduction of deception (hiding the VR condition in the brief) would have generated a more accurate picture of VR learning.

But how do we know if we can ethically deceive a participant? there is some discrepancies between psychologists, but they do focus around the same generic principles. According to  Arndt Bröder there are three main principles behined deception in research:

1. Acceptability of methodology & Deception Are Separate: If it is ‘ethical’  to deceive it does not mean the method is ethical. The ethics  for each should be considered separately. In other words don’t judge the butter by the bread (NB: Don’t write when your hungry).

2. Necessary Topics:  Deception isn’t always appropriate, only when the information is harmful or  when knowledge will taint the integrity of the research. As psychologists we can’t go around telling porkies constantly it is not respectful to participants (and would be very confusing).

3. Participants Consent: This may initially seem odd, BUT its not the deception the participant is asked to agree to. It is during the debriefing that the participants are informed of the research’s true nature, here the participant must sign a consent form as to weather they still wish for there data to be used… Better late than never.

This approach to deception is supported by APA ethics to which all psychologists must uphold. The director of ethics at APA Stephen Behnke claims deception is necessary if  the research has scientific, educational, or applied value. If there is a good contribution researchers can get the nod on a little white lie, as long as the participant is not subject to harm and consents to the deception.

Would Mrs Doubtfire have ethical approval?

Under Bröder ethics would be granted in a heartbeat, creating Mrs Doubtfire was  necessary deception for Daniel to have contact with his children. However under the APA guidelines Mrs Doubtfire would have been highly rejected as there is no scientific value of dressing up as an elderly woman. This is a very brief indication that deception is not clear cut, although we have guidelines to follow, they are vague and difficult to apply.

Ok, lets wrap this up … deception is a vital part of controlling confounding variables such as history & knowledge. Deception is much a part of research as it is in daily life. Deception allows us to achieve goals without the opinions of others interfering. As for the appropriateness…  I advise you to crack open your APA guide, there is no simple answer,  It is important that we don’t over use deception as trustfulness and respect are key principles of any psychologist and deception taints these principles.

So let us see deception as an old woman outfit… only use when really necessary… we wouldn’t want to over do it.

Thank You for Reading

please leave a comment, I didn’t have enough space to include any examples of deception in research and whether or not it was appropriately used, my loss is your gain, if you have any examples please do share : )

If you have not seen Mrs Doubtfire  you must go watch this film!! If this is you…. go, go, go!

Til next time, good bye 🙂

OR

 in the words of Mrs Euphegenia Doubtfire

“Toodlie Pip”