bocchiaro - 2012 Flashcards
What is whistleblowing?
involved reporting an unethical incident to higher authorities - taking on immediate superiors who have authority over you
What are they key elements of whistleblowing in the real world?
- unethical issues
- criminal acts (money laundering)
- safety of the general public
How can whistleblowing be described?
The challenging moral path
What is the personal characteristic which affects the likelihood of whistleblowing?
faith - more faith = more likely to whistle blow
What was Bocchiaro’s false aim?
to investigate the effects of sensory deprivation on brain function
What is Bocchiaro’s aim?
to find out what types of people disobey, or blow the whistle and if there are personal characteristics that differentiate them from those who obey
What is Bocchiaro’s ethical aim?
to have mundane realism and be ethically sound so no psychological harm occurred
What is the DV?
obeying, disobeying, or blowing the whistle
What are the 4 hypotheses?
1- Participants will be more obedient than those
in Milgram’s study
2- Participants will be less likely to whistle-blow than obey because whistleblowing will involve direct contact with an unjust authority figure
3- Participants will overestimate the tendency to disobey or blow the whistle when asked to predict others’ behaviour
4- Personality will not have much effect
What are the pilot study details?
- 8 total
- 92 participants
- checks for credibility and ethically acceptable
What was the sample?
- 149 undergraduate VU University of Amsterdam students
- 96 women and 53 men
- volunteers
- further 138 surveyed
What are the strengths of the sample?
- large = representative = generalisable
What are the weaknesses of the sample?
- lacks population validity
- culture bias (Amsterdam)
- age bias (all uni students)
What was the sampling technique?
Self-selected (volunteer)
How was the sample recruited?
flyers in the university cafeteria
What are strengths of this sampling technique?
- less chance of attrition
What are the weaknesses of this sampling technique?
- only a certain type of person volunteers - not representative of everyone therefore not generalisable
What was the method?
laboratory study
What are the weaknesses of this method?
- lacks mundane realism
- not ecologically valid
What are the strengths of this method?
- high control over EVs
What was the setting for this study?
two rooms specifically prepared in a VU uni lab
What was the role of the 138 undergraduates?
- given a detailed description of the study
- asked two questions:
1- What would you do?
2- What would an average student at your university do?
How long does the main experiment last?
40 minutes
What did the participants get told at the start of the study?
- given the right to withdraw
- signed consent forms which guaranteed confidentiality in results
Who was the experimenter?
- Dutch male
- formally dressed
- possessed a stern demeanour
What was the first thing the experimenter asked the participants do?
provide a few names of fellow students and then presented the cover story
What is the gist of the cover study?
- investigating the effects of sensory deprivation
- previous research in Rome had disastrous effects
- majority said it was a frightening experience
What did the cover story require the participants to do?
- write a statement to convince students to participate in the experiment
- using words like ‘superb’ and ‘exciting’
What happened after the experimenter told the participant about what they want them to do?
He left the room for 3 minutes in order to let them to reflect on whatever decision they want to make
What were participants instructed not to do in these statements?
not to mention the negative effects of the sensory deprivation
What conditions did participants write their statement in?
- 7 minutes
- no experimenter in the room
What could participants do if they did not want to write the statement?
anonymously challenge it by putting a form in the mailbox
What happened after the statement?
- experimenter comes back and invites the participant into the first room where they take 2 personality inventories
- they are fully debriefed and asked to sign a second consent form
What are the two personality inventories?
1- HEXACO-PI-R
2) Decomposed Games Measure
What does the HEXACO-PI-R measure?
6 basic personality traits by rating agreement on 60 statements using a Likert Scale
1= strongly disagree
5 = strongly agree
What are the 6 traits measured?
- humility/honesty
- openness to experiences
- emotionality
- extraversion
- agreeableness
- conscientiousness
What does the Decomposed Games Measure assess?
how much importance a person places on the welfare of another person in relation to their own welfare
How many items is the DGM?
9
What is the DGM?
- point system
- asked to imagine that they had been randomly paired with another person who is not someone they will ever know or meet
What are the 3 options of the DGM?
A= ‘you’ - 500 ‘other’ - 100
B= ‘you’ - 500 ‘other’ - 500
C = ‘you’ - 550 ‘other’ - 300
What are the different classifications of the DGM?
prosocial, individualistic, competitive - if score 6/9 in any of the categories
How was religiosity measured?
asking participants about their religious affiliation (what their religion was) - frequency of worship and extent of faith
What are key results of the comparison students?
‘What would you do?’
- 3.6% = obey
- 64.5% = whistle-blow
- 31.9% = disobey
‘Average student’
- 18.8% = obey
- 43.9% = disobey
- 37.3% = whistle-blow
What were the results of the study?
- 76.5% obeyed
- 14.1% disobeyed
- 9.4% whistle-blew
What are the factors which did not affect whether participants obeyed, disobeyed, or whistle-blew?
- personality does not explain obedience (HEXACO-PI-R)
- no sig. gender or religious differences
What are the conclusions of the study?
- estimates of ones own behaviours and the behaviours of others are wildly inaccurate
- no personality differences distinguished between those who obey, disobey, or whistle-blow
- the belief that people think they are better than others makes them blind to social pressures
Is this study reductionism or holism?
reductionism
What is a strength of reductionism?
scientific - contributes to the understanding of behaviour as key variables are studied in a controlled way - more valid
What is a weakness of reductionism?
reductionist - only suggests a situational explanation - oversimplifies why people obey, disobey, or whistle-blow - decreases validity
What are the ethical issues in the study?
- deception
