alt Hacker News> In 2006, when he was a professor at the MIT Media Lab, Ariely conducted experiments including administering electric shocks with a research assistant who had no human–subject training. […] Ariely confirmed this and said that he wasn't aware that the research assistant did not have the needed one-hour online human–subject training.
A one-hour online training is all that’s needed to be considered ready to conduct experiments involving things like electric shocks on human subjects?
Forget about this guy, the entire field needs to be burned to the ground and rebuilt from scratch.
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Look up violet wands, you can shock humans with 0 training when it's a consensual hobby.
I don't know the details here but I am a psychologist.
The "electric shock" normally used in psych studies is tiny, it's like the equivalent of one of those little toy prank buzzers. You couldn't possibly hurt someone with it, this is really a non-issue.
Related side note: Electroconvulsive therapy uses much larger electric shocks but, administered safely by a clinic, is extremely safe, has relatively minor side effects compared to e.g. SSRIs, and is very effective for severe depression. It's a huge shame that it's undeserved reputation prevents it from being more popular. Blame "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" for its inaccurate portrayal.
I would not make such a harsh judgment just because electric shocks are involved.
During my master’s I took a class at the Media Lab called Human 2.0 on prostheses, orthoses, exoskeletons, and human augmentation. Unsurprisingly, all student final projects involved some form of human experimentation.
To run our final project’s experiments, we had to complete a few online modules on bioethics, first aid, and safe practices, as well as submit a proposal to the IRB. From what I saw across projects, the board applied appropriate scrutiny and made helpful contributions.
It classified our experiment as low risk, and a lot of care went into participant selection and adherence to the approved protocol, but they did not require any health professional to be present during the sessions.
Other projects, however, did require such support and even had some MIT Medical involvement.
Incidentally, my project also involved administering electrical shocks to subjects, albeit very mild ones (tACS to induce directed visual artifacts).