Research With Foster Children : Ethical Dilemmas

The research topic Foster Care is the topic that has been proclaimed. The research question begins with, “What are some of the challenges facing the placement, and adjustment of Foster Care in the Valley?” This study is important because there are several challenges that are difficult for a Foster child facing being in Foster care. It is important in Social work that the Government with a Social worker must be responsible for taking away the child who is either being physical or sexual abused, neglected, or not being taken care of by their primary caregivers. In this type of situation, the child will be put into Foster care. It is key to understand the big challenges each child entering Foster care might have already experienced in the past

However, when they conducted their experiments they did not breach any ethical guidelines since they did not exist (Matta, 2014). Hence, to protect the welfare, rights, dignity, and mental health of the participants, strict ethical guidelines were introduced in psychological experiments which have positively influenced the field of psychology. Also, due to ethical frameworks, people are viewed as ‘participants’ of a study instead of ‘subjects’ in an experiment. They also make psychological experiments more reputable, leading to an increase in the willingness of participation by people as their safety is ensured. The increased willingness of participation is beneficial in order to discover more about human behaviour, the effectiveness of treatment, mechanisms of a psychiatric disorder etc.

The National Institutes of Health funded research conducted in at least seven states was unethical and morally irresponsible. While some research advocates point to the fact foster care children received access to cutting edge antiretroviral drugs they would otherwise not receive because of their socioeconomic backgrounds, this cannot excuse the lack of advocacy and protection these children and adolescents were not provided. Research for the greater good cannot disregard ethics and violate already vulnerable children, such as those that find themselves without parents and in the foster care system. Therefore, the government funded clinical trials these foster care children were subjected to violated their rights. Advocates were not needed

In this case study, there were a few incidents of violations of ethics. In 1998, Callahan recommends that researchers should follow the three ethical issues: Autonomy, beneficence, and human justice. Autonomy is the first ethical principle that a researcher should respect the participate and make sure that informed consent has been given. The participates of this study was not aware the risk or what the study was about and actually could not give consent legally because they were minors. Johnson and Tudor did not give full disclosure of this research to the minors, teachers, or matrons at the orphanage. Beneficence is the second ethical principle; the researcher should maximize

Other health problems arise when the trauma from past experiences such as abuse or violence in the home cause long term effects in the children. The needs of children in foster care are multifaceted and the problems are exacerbated when the resources in the community are scarce and when the service system is fragmented (Halfon, Berkowitz, & Klee, 1993). Due to the complexity of their problems and the degree of vulnerability, a well-trained and

The maltreatments that children face prior to entering into the foster care system can be grouped into neglect, physical abuse, psychological maltreatment, and sexual abuse. Though these forms of abuse can be identified separately identified, they often occur concurrently with

Some children are in foster care, because they were physical abuse by one or both parents. The parents have physically abused the child

Science, medicine, and psychology are powerful tools capable of increasing human understanding of the world, curing diseases, or assisting individuals in living more fulfilling lives. The potential for good is drastic; however, a potential for hurt exists as well. Although history is full of stories documenting the positives of research, events of scientific research hurting individuals still haunt history. These events, including the Holocaust and the Tuskegee experiments, demonstrate instances where scientific research on human beings is clearly unethical and damaging. Due to horrific events such as these, the National Commission for the Protection of Human Subjects of Biomedical and Behavioral Research published the Ethical Principles and Guidelines for the Protection of Human Subjects of Research, or Belmont Report, in 1979.

It was reported on 10/10/17 that the foster children did not have dinner. It was reported that there is no food in the home. It was disclosed to reporting party (RP) that the foster mother (FM) has 2 refrigerators; one for the foster children and the other is for FM’s family. The foster children’s refrigerator is bare and FM’s refrigerator is full. The foster children are not allowed to go into the other refrigerator. It was disclosed to RP that the FM has snack but there are no snacks for the foster children. It was also reported that there is no food in the cabinets. FC#2 reported that FM may cook 1 meal a week for the family and that FM goes grocery shopping every other week, but the food does not last. RP was told that the foster children

The APA ethical guidelines help to ensure that all psychological research maintains the integrity that it does not do harm or conflicts with the majority of the human populations moral ethical codes. However, in some situations the APA ethical guidelines must be viewed as just that: guidelines. If a study has the potential to benefit humanity as a whole and does not result in the permanent or irreparable harm to a human being then some guidelines must be permitted to be stretched or even broken in the interest of human advancement and scientific progression. After all the goal and responsibility of a psychologist is to enhance our understanding of human behavior as well as to find ways to use this information to better society and humanity

Psychological research has been growing and developing new ways of studying human behavior, collecting knowledge and expanding our understanding of our nature. For instance, studies involving human subjects presented risks for violation of ethical research guidelines, by pushing the limits of human experience (Kim, 2012). Throughout history, there have been numerous studies that elevated this concern, such as the Milgram Experiment of 1963. One of the major ethical raised was that it lacked informed consent from the participants and eventually raised the issue of protecting human subjects. This paper examines the ethical compliance in psychological research and emphasizes the importance of ethics and professionalism by analyzing different

Fraenkel, Wallen, and Hyun (2015) states “It is a fundamental responsibility of every researcher to do all in his or her power to ensure that participants in a research study are protected from physical or psychological harm, discomfort, or danger that may arise due to research procedures”.

Protection of the participants was not followed. The BPS ethical guidelines, as Anderson’s (2017) summary points out, investigators have a responsibility to be sure all participants are protected from psychological harm. It is clear from this research that the participants were in distress and were not willing to proceed with the experiment.

Once appropriate consent has been gained from the relevant adults the researcher is then required to gain permission from the actual participant. This however does not need to be a signature or written permission, a signal that they are willing to participate will suffice (SRCD, 2009, as cited in Noret, n.d). When gaining permissions from the child the researcher should consider the following:

This essay is a continuation to a previous assignment which discussed how attitudes towards studying children have changed. In this child participation, child voice and consent were identified as three key principles researchers should aspire to when studying children. This essay therefore intends to extend upon these principles by identifying an approach and research tool which will effectively incorporate all principles within a research study.