Deceptive research can conceal participant sorting from subjects indefinitely

Evidence

I have never, however, told the students about the discrete codings of Lows’ and Highs’ answer sheets. The only people with whom I have ever shared this “Secret of the Secret Survey” are my local Ethical Review Committee and the handful of extremely studious and trustworthy people who read the methodology chapters in my books. — Bob Altemeyer, The Authoritarian Specter, 754

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to Milgram’s hidden-observer ethics debates and to the general question of when deception in research is justified — a running tension in this book’s methodology overall.
• QUESTION: Is concealing the sorting procedure from participants ethically sound when the whole point is sensitive disclosure? Modern IRB standards would likely flag this.