American Psychological Association Code of Ethics Breanna Stout I am working towards earning my Bachelor of Science in Psychology in Applied Behavioral Analysis. I plan to do research with my degree, because I plan to do research in the psychological field, I will be using the American Psychological Association Code of Ethics. This code of ethics is not held by law but is used for guidance of those institutes who decide to abide by them (Ethical principles of psychologists and code of conduct 2017). There is a higher standard to uphold when it comes to the code of ethics compared to actual law, it is expected to go above and beyond in your area of work. There are five main principles in the American Psychological Association Code of Ethics. Beneficence and nonmaleficence means to help as much as you can while also doing as little harm as possible. I will do research to try and help as many people as I can, while also doing as little harm as possible during the research process. Fidelity and responsibility which is taking responsibility in establishing and maintaining healthy relationships with …show more content…
This means using the guide will lead to ethical decision making (Bush, 2019). For example, say you want to research infant mortality; it would be unethical to kill a baby for research, however, it is ethical to use observations and recordings of infants who have already passed. The code of ethics can help you decide to do a case study on infant mortality instead of not researching the issue at all. A different example could be you walk in on one of your colleagues inappropriately talking to a research patient, with a code of ethics you can go to a manager or administrator to turn them in and help the participant. The code of ethics can guide decision making in almost any circumstance and was made to have a wide enough range to do so (Bush,