What differentiates commonsense understandings of the world from scientific sociological participant and nonparticipant observations? Why might it be necessary to apply research methods to our social world? What might we gain?

Do you think that the results yielded from the Milgram and Zimbardo experiments were beneficial enough to outweigh the ethical concerns of the experiments? Follow-up questionnaires with Milgram’s participants found that most were “glad” they had participated. Does that surprise you?

If you were going to be a participant in a research study, which type of research methodology would you want to be a part of, and why?