No consent needed? In which of the circumstances below would you allow collecting personal information without the subjects’ consent?

(a) A government agency takes a random sample of income tax returns to obtain information on the average income of people in different occupations.

Only the incomes and occupations are recorded from the returns, not the names.

(b) A social psychologist attends public meetings of a religious group to study the behavior patterns of members.

(c) A social psychologist pretends to be converted to membership in a religious group and attends private meetings to study the behavior patterns of members.