Ethics of animal experimentation --- the arguments for testing animals
The reasons for conducting animal research in psychlogy
Ethical reasons – many experiments that psycholigists want to conduct are deemed unethical for human testing , but important enough to be justified for animal testing . such experiments might involve controlled interbreeding , deprivation studies , brain surgry , or the trail testing of drugs .
Evolutionary continuum – some psychologists , such as the behaviourists,claimed that animal research was justified because humans have evolved from other animals and so the difference between them is only quantitative.since humans are just more complex animals,it makes sense to study more simple organisms first,and then generalise to humans by ‘scaling up’the results.
Conveience—animals are’good subjects’,they do not try to understand the purpose of the experiment,are more controllable,and their faster breeding cycles allow tests to be conducted on the influence of heredity and environment on behaviour.