SIS Project Preparation Week 5: Ethics

SIS Project Week 5: Research Ethics

• In this project you will consider some basics of how to conduct research ethically.
• Adapted from material by Dr. Kara A. Makara, School
• of Education, University of Glasgow. R. Elmslie 2016

Ethical principles

• There are some basic ethical principles, or basic rules, that you should follow when you conduct research.
• Even though this is only a small classroom research project, it's a good idea to start thinking about these issues before you start your postgraduate programmes, where you will consider them in more depth.
• Many of these principles are quite obvious and you probably do them already.
• However, you may not have thought about some others and may need to take a little more care, or make some small changes to the way you're doing or presenting your project.
• Some other principles may be less familiar to you because they are based on culture.
• 

Voluntary participation

• The
• participant should decide on their own that they want to participate in the
• study.
• They should feel comfortable to say "no" to taking part in your project.
• 

Risk

• The benefits of the study should be greater than
• the risks.
• You
• must try to avoid any risks to both the participant and yourself.
• Risk comes in
• many forms, including physical injury, the feeling that one is being seen as
• inferior (not as good as other people), embarrassment or fear; taking part in a
• badly designed study; giving out (“disclosing”) personal information and data
• being made public, and many more.
• There are also risks to the
• researcher – think about your safety, eg where will you meet people to
• interview them that is safe?

Informed consent

• The
• participant should clearly understand what the study is about and what their
• participation will involve.
• For example, what will they do? When? Why? How long will it take? How will the information
• they give you be used?
• If they know about and understand these things, they are informed.
• They should give their consent
• (agreement) to participate before the study begins.
• How? They read a "plain language
• statement" which explains in simple English what you and they will do, and how the information they give you will be used.
• For interviews and some observations, they'll sign a consent form too.
• 

Confidentiality

• You
• must keep individual responses private and store data securely.
• Do not share results with others until the
• identity of participants has been taken out so they cannot be identified.
• In a
• survey, use averages from the whole sample so individual people can't be identified.
• When you present information that you got from
• interviews, give the interviewee a pseudonym (when you don’t use the interviewee’s real
• name) and be careful to avoid revealing their identity.
• You will normally tell the interviewee and person who completes the questionnaire that the information they give will be confidential and anonymous.
• 

Standards of integrity

• There are some important shared values in scientific research. These include:
• Honesty - show information truthfully.
• Accuracy - report findings precisely and take
• care to avoid errors.
• Efficiency -use resources wisely and avoid waste
• (including money and time of all participants).
• Objectivity - let the facts speak for themselves.
• Source: Steneck, N. H. 2007. ORI - Introduction
• to the Responsible Conduct of Research, Washington D.C. , U.S. Government
• Printing Office, p.3

Now try the quiz.

• Do the quiz at the link below to test your understanding of the ideas from this resource.
• http://loc.llas.ac.uk/lob/1791/view