Which practice best preserves confidentiality in psychological research?

• A. Protects privacy; maintain via anonymization, data encryption, secure storage, and de-identified reporting.
• B. Maintains confidentiality by keeping a list of participants' names for follow-up.
• C. Sharing raw data publicly with identifying information.
• D. Relying solely on password protection without encryption.

Answer: (A)

Confidentiality in psychological research means protecting participants' identities and sensitive information from exposure. The best practice combines removing or masking identifiers (anonymization and de-identification), encrypting data, storing it securely, and reporting results in a way that cannot reveal who participated. Anonymization and de-identification break the link between data and personal identity, while encryption protects data if devices are lost or intercepted, and secure storage adds access controls so only authorized people can reach the information. Reporting in a de-identified form ensures findings are useful without exposing individuals.

Maintaining a list of participants’ names for follow-up preserves a direct link between identity and data, increasing the risk if any breach occurs. Sharing raw data publicly with identifying information would reveal identities, which is incompatible with confidentiality. Relying only on password protection without encryption leaves data vulnerable— passwords can be compromised, and unencrypted data can be read even with strong passwords.