What are ethics? Ethics refers to the behavior of conforming to the norms or standards of a group. Why are ethics important in criminological research? The reason is that researchers follow ethical procedures to avoid any physical or psychological harm to the interviewee or even the researchers themselves. Maxfield and Babbie (2015) argue that ethical issues in criminal justice are particularly problematic as the nature of their study frequently focuses on illegal behaviors that individuals tend to keep private. Therefore, research, if not conducted according to ethical guidelines, will result in harm to individuals, communities and the environment. Additionally, the three most important ethical issues explored in this work include voluntary participation, anonymity, and deception. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why violent video games should not be banned”? Get an original essay The first ethical principle to be discussed is voluntary participation, as Israel and Hay (2006) point out that respondents should have legal capacity to give permission, they should be able to exercise the power of free choice without the intervention of elements of force, fraud, deception, violence or other subsequent forms of coercion. Simply put, no one should be forced to participate, participants should be informed of a variety of information, including the scope of the study, what they expect to find in the study, and any problems which they should be aware of. After being informed, participation in the study must be voluntary and subjects have the right to discontinue at any time and not be penalized for withdrawal or refusal to participate. However, researchers conduct studies without voluntary participation, for example when examining the activities of burglars, sexual victimization, or even the discriminatory functioning of criminal justice officials. Some believe that this method of research must be conducted to truly uncover reliable answers because behavior is observed in its natural form. Laud Humphrey's (1970) study "Tearoom Trade" is an example of covert observation. Covert observation raised serious ethical questions, particularly studies like Laud Humphrey's, which are still debated to this day. Covert observation violates all principles of voluntary participation, subjects are able to decide whether they wish to participate or refuse to participate, whereas covert observation removes this power of freedom and places this choice under the control of the researcher at the time. without the subject's knowledge, which is unfair. and immoral, voluntary participation is an important issue regarding criminology research because it avoids harm, psychological and even in some cases physical, both of which could affect subjects and researchers. Moving on to the next ethical issue regarding research participants is anonymity, in criminological research. this is when the identity of a subject is protected, neither the researcher nor the readers of the results can identify the response given to the subject, an example of research methods for which the criminologist uses anonymity are mail surveys because there are no identification numbers, names, etc. hand over the questionnaire before it returns to the researchers. Confidentiality and anonymity are different, in criminological research confidentiality is when..