THE PSYCHOLOGY DEBATOR'S HANDBOOK
(2022 version)
CONTENTS
1. This house believes that Stanley Milgram was fully justified to do his research into obedience
2. This house believes that laboratory experiments on non-human animals tell us little about human behaviour
3. This house believes that homosexuality is caused by a "gay gene"
4. This house believes that psychoanalysis does not work
THIS HOUSE BELIEVES THAT STANLEY MILGRAM WAS FULLY JUSTIFIED TO DO HIS RESEARCH INTO OBEDIENCE
FOR
1. Psychology is about the study of behaviour, even the darker aspects of behaviour. There are many cases of ordinary people obeying orders to kill others. It is important for psychologists to understand why obedience can lead to massacres of civilians, like Mi Lai in the Vietnam War in the 1970s, and so it is necessary to study such behaviour. Milgram, in 1964, said that the problem of "destructive obedience" was "the most disturbing expression of obedience in our time and because it is the most perplexing, merits intensive study".
2. It is important to show that the people who do extreme acts, like genocide, are not a few evil ones, but that anybody can do such behaviour if certain factors exist. Milgram's many experiments attempted to find out what those factors for obedience were.
3. When the factors that lead to obedience are known, individuals can be taught to be disobedient when they are commanded to do acts that are morally wrong.
4. Milgram's experiments did not have any lasting effect upon the participants. The debriefing involved reassurances that the electric shocks were not real and no harm had come to the "learner". Many of the participants were visited one year after the experiment by a psychiatrist who found no permanent psychological damage.
5. Many of the participants themselves (84%) were glad or very glad to have taken part in such important research. Furthermore, 74% said they felt they had learnt something of personal importance. In fact, Milgram's work has been called the "most morally significant research in modern psychology", and a "momentous and meaningful contribution to our knowledge of human behaviour".
AGAINST
1. If the end justifies the means, then psychologists could do anything to participants on the basis of the importance of the findings. There are many examples in the history of psychology of the mistreatment of participants (or more appropriately, subjects) by researchers, who believed that they did not have to treat participants with respect (eg: simulating major plane malfunction in flight to test stress). Reason and Rowan, in 1981, said "good research means never having to say you are sorry".
2. Milgram's work was experimental. This means that it was artificial (ie low ecological validity), and the participants may have behaved differently to real life. Orne and Holland pointed out that people obeyed in the same way as they do when a magician performs a trick to "chop off your head". You know it will be alright. The best way to study certain behaviours, like destructive obedience, is through research on real-life events (eg: interviews with soldiers who were involved in civilian massacres).
3. Diane Baumrind, in the 1960s, argued that Milgram deliberately caused ordinary people anguish and distress, who had volunteered for what they thought was a memory experiment. Many participants were observed by Milgram himself to sweat, tremble, bite their lips, and even dig their fingernails into their flesh. The participants were also deceived in many ways.
Psychologists should not be proud of such behaviour. Baumrind said that the "fundamental moral principles of reciprocity and justice are violated, when the research psychologist, using his position of trust, acts to deceive or degrade".
4. Furthermore, participants left the experiment in a very different frame of mind compared to when they arrived. Finding out that you have the potential to kill an innocent stranger is disturbing knowledge, which can affect a person's self-esteem. And it was knowledge that the participants did not ask for.
5. Why ordinary people do extreme acts does not have a simple answer. It is too complex to answer by simple experiments that focus upon one variable only (like the experimenter wearing a white coat or not). Real-life situations have shown that fear for one's own life is also involved. In conflicts around the world, individuals are told to kill their neighbours or else they will be killed.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
- Milgram and Baumrind debate "American Psychologist" 1964, no 19
- Brewer, K (2001) "Ethical Issues for the Study of Human Behaviour by Psychologists" Orsett, Essex: Orsett Psychological Services
- Moxon, D; Brewer, K & Emmerson, P (2003) "Heineman Psychology AS for AQA A" Oxford: Heinemann
THIS HOUSE BELIEVES THAT LABORATORY EXPERIMENTS ON NON-HUMAN ANIMALS TELL US LITTLE ABOUT HUMAN BEHAVIOUR
FOR
1. A large number of psychology experiments in laboratories with non-human animals use rats and mice (between half to three-quarters). These animals are very different to humans both in their behaviour and their physiology. For example, the cerebral cortex is so much smaller relative to the size of the whole brain. In fact, other mammals vary between themselves. In a famous example from the 1960s, Fisher injected the same neurotransmitter into the same area of the brain in cats and rats, and got different reactions.
2. Non-human animals are not able to tell us how they feel, so the researcher can only guess from the animal's behaviour. Language is also a key difference in mediating thought in humans (as well as culture).
3. A moral argument against the use of non-human animals in experiments is summed up by Australian philosopher, Peter Singer: "Either the animal is not like us, in which case there is no reason for performing the experiment; or else the animal is like us, in which case we ought not to perform an experiment on the animal which would be considered outrageous if performed on one of us". Singer coined the phrase "speciesism" to mean favouring one's own species over another, and he argued that animals have rights.
4. Many laboratory experiments are inflicting pain and suffering, not necessarily for good reason. Peter Singer, again, sees most studies in science using non-human animals as "trivial and unpleasant".
5. Laboratory experiments are unreal environments. If there are benefits to studying non-human animals, it must be done through research in their natural habitat.
AGAINST
1. Human beings are animals in the evolutionary sense, and so a lot can be learnt from other species. At a physiological level, mammalian brains are built in the same way (ie neurons and synapses). Thus non-human animals display simple behaviour which can tell us about complex behaviour. It is an untenable position to argue that human beings are absolutely unique among animals species.
2. Non-human animals can be used in experiments which would not be acceptable with humans. A lot of recent research is able to genetically engineer mice to see the effects of a genetic mutation. Deliberate genetic mutation for experimental purposes is seen as morally unacceptable in humans. Psychological research would be highly limited were there no study of non-human animals.
3. Many species have short lifespans, and so it is possible to observe the behaviour throughout their lives and into future generations. This is so much quicker than following human behaviour for decades. It is also easier to study small animals, for example, in scientific rigorous ways.
4. There are direct benefits to humans from experiments on non-human animals. These include the testing of new drugs for mental illness. Drug companies try many drug compounds before they are tested on humans, and the use of non-human animals saves time, particularly for compounds that do not work. Jeffrey Gray argued against the accusation of speciesism by saying that "we owe a special duty to members of our own species".
5. Studying non-human animals in the laboratory can also tell us about what humans can't and don't do anymore in terms of understanding evolutionary development. Animal models are a vital part of understanding evolution, and the evolutionary basis of human behaviour.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
- Singer and Gray debate "American Psychologist" 1991, no 14
- Materials about animal replacement in medical science (https://www.animalfreeresearchuk.org/)
- Thomas, G (1991) Animal experiments in psychology. In Cochrane, R & Carroll, D (eds) "Psychology and Social Issues" Sussex: Falmer Press