History of Ethics in Psychology

  • 6500 BCE

    Trephination

    Trephination
    Trephination is where a medicine man would drill a hole(s) into the skull of a person who was suspected to have demons due to his/her abnormal behavior. I chose this event because I think it is interesting how humans used to hold such barbaric beliefs for treatments compared to the more humane treatments we use today.
  • Concentration Camp Experiments

    Concentration Camp Experiments
    During the existence of the Nazis, human experiments were conducted on homosexuals, the Jewish, and others not born of pure Aryan race. Examples include sleep deprivation, starvation, given surgery without an anesthetic etc. I chose this topic because it demonstrates that even though humans had moved on from treatments or experiments such as trephination, we had still not enforced ethical guidelines that could have prevented these inhumane practices.
  • Zimbardo Prison Experiment

    Zimbardo Prison Experiment
    Twenty-four male students from Stanford University were selected to participate in a 6 day mock prison experiment in which some were randomly chosen to be guards and the others to be inmates. I chose this event because it demonstrated how easily people who are given some authority over a group of others can become unsound in their reasonings to the treatment of the other people due to their status.
  • Belmont Conference Center

    Belmont Conference Center
    The National Commission for the Protection of Human Subjects of Biomedical and Behavioral Research met at the Belmont Conference Center at Howard Community College in Maryland which resulted in the release of the Belmont Report. I chose this event because the report has made some very significant points in research which involve ethical guidelines in terms of respecting the people involved and doing no harm to the subjects while also benefiting their well-being.