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CHAPTER 3: Ethical Issues in the Conduct of Psychological Research 67Key Concept• Informed consent must be obtained from legal guardians for individualsunable to provide consent (e.g., young children, mentally impairedindividuals); assent to participate should be obtained from individualsunable to provide informed consent.• Researchers should consult with knowledgeable others, including an IRB,when deciding whether to dispense with informed consent, such as whenresearch is conducted in public settings. These settings require specialattention to protecting individuals’ privacy.• Privacy refers to the rights of individuals to decide how information aboutthem is to be communicated to others.A substantial portion of the Ethics Code dealing with research is devoted toissues related to informed consent. This is appropriate because informed consentis an essential component of the social contract between the researcherand the participant. Informed consent is a person’s explicitly expressed willingnessto participate in a research project based on a clear understandingof the nature of the research, of the consequences for not participating, andof all factors that might be expected to influence that person’s willingness toparticipate (see Figure 3.3).FIGURE 3.3The U.S. Public Health Service between 1932 and 1972 examined the course of untreatedsyphilis in poor African American men from Macon County, Alabama, who had not giveninformed consent. They were unaware they had syphilis and their disease was left untreated.Survivors were recognized by the Clinton administration.