Ethics and Standards of Professional PracticePSYC-8705-6 | Final PaperEthical Issues in Family and Marital TherapyHealth Psychology Program | | Denise A. Bolden-Little | 11/7/2010 |

Introduction

Due to the extremely sensitive nature of marital and family therapy, it is imperative that therapists engage in the ethical, competent treatment of their clients. There are three aspects of marriage and family therapy research that makes it unique from other research fields: 1) multiple family members are involved; 2) it involves extremely sensitive information; and 3) it is performed in conjunction with therapy. According to Hohmann-Marriott (2001), because of these aspects as well as the researcher’s responsibility to conduct
Inaccurate data can negatively affect the researcher’s career as well as the overall field of study. It matters not whether the erroneous information was gathered accidently or deliberately. Some measures that can reduce the risk of collecting incorrect data include: asking others to monitor research methods; utilize standardized and practiced procedures; practice diligence in data collection; and stress the importance of honesty in data-collection (Hohmann-Marriott, 2001). As purported in the article by Hohmann-Marriott (2001), the reporting of accurate data is equally important as the collection of accurate data. Just as collecting erroneous information can negatively impact the researcher’s career and the discipline, so can falsely reporting data. Needless to say, it is unethical to only report data that confirms the researcher’s hypothesis. However, it is also deleterious to report data that result from mistakes or misinterpretation. It is indeed the researcher’s duty to consult experts when necessary (i.e., statisticians). The final guideline stipulated in the ethical research of marital and family therapy is minimizing the effects of researcher’s bias. Because all researchers have values and biases about their research, it is vital to understand how these