2.1 What are the most important ethical rules?
Ethical rules and principles are designed to ‘protect the dignity, rights and welfare of research participants’ (WHO, no date). While the details may vary slightly between different codes, the basic ethical principles remain the same. In the next activity, you will think about how these ethical principles can be applied to the research you will carry out in your project.
Activity 2 Ethical principles on research projects
Timing: You should allow yourself 25 minutes to do this activity.
- a.Watch the following video where Helen Kara outlines the basic principles of research ethics. Make notes on the key points she discusses in the video.
Download this video clip.Video player: Video 2 Why is research ethics so important?
Transcript: Video 2 Why is research ethics so important?
[MUSIC PLAYING]
HELEN KARA
Hello. I want to pose a question today. And the question is, why is research ethics important? We hear a lot about research ethics. People talk a lot about it, but nobody ever seems to stop to ask, why is it so important? So that’s what I want to think about and talk about with you today.
Ethics can be very instrumental, very much a means to an end for researchers to get their ethics application approved. And then they’ll say ‘I’ve done ethics’, and they’ll crack on and do their research without ever thinking about ethics again. But this, to me, isn’t real research ethics. And in my view, real research ethics is essential.
So let me explain what I think real research ethics is. It’s not about filling in a form. It’s not about getting a stamp of approval from a committee of other people. It’s not about ethical theories that people talk about with very long words like ‘deontology’ and ‘consequentialism.’ What research ethics is really about, in my view – and actually, this is based on worldwide research done by the Trust Project, so it’s not just my view – research ethics is about respect, honesty, fairness, and care.
The Trust Project was an EU-funded project that was run from the University of Central Lancashire here in the UK, and they asked people in different parts of the world what matters to you in research ethics. And these four points came up again and again and again. People said we want respect, honesty, fairness, and care, and not just here and there, but all the way through the research project and even beyond into aftercare, because a significant amount of research around the world has been conducted unethically and is being conducted unethically today.
It’s not a problem of the past. It’s often taught as though it’s a problem of the past, but actually, it’s a problem of the present. There is unethical research practice happening in many parts of the world. I wish that was not a real thing, but it is. Having said that, it’s also the case that a lot of research is conducted very ethically, and whether directly or indirectly, sets out to create benefit. Research is often done to try to improve things – to find treatments for diseases, to find ways to help people who don’t have clean water to get clean water, to find answers to problems that we have in the world like the climate crisis.
And that, of course, is ethical in itself. And then if that research is also conducted with respect, honesty, fairness, and care, that is truly ethical research. So, for me, research ethics is about making sure that this happens at all levels all the way through the research process. Of course, some of the four aspects are more relevant at particular stages in research. For example, when you’re designing a research project, you need to use more care to design that as carefully as you can.
And then when you’re working with other people in the course of your research – if you’re collecting primary data, you might be working with participants, gatekeepers, and so on – then respect is very important in the way that you interact with those people. But overall, if we, as much as we can, practise respect, honesty, fairness, and care throughout the process of conducting research, then our research will be ethical.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
Video 2 Why is research ethics so important?
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Comment
In the video, Helen Kara summarises the outcome of a worldwide research project, the Trust project. This identified that real research ethics involves research being carried out with respect, honesty, fairness and care. These four principles should be considered all the way through the project and beyond. However, different principles may be more important at some stages than at others. For example, it is important to design the research carefully. However, when working with other people, there is also a need for respect. Helen noted that today a lot of research is being carried out unethically, but prioritising the principles of respect, honesty, fairness and care will make sure your research is carried out in an ethical way.
- b.Kara identified respect, honesty, fairness and care as being the overarching ethical principles. Consider the following ‘golden rules’ for carrying out policy research. For each golden rule, which of the main ethical principles apply? There may be more than one answer for each statement, as indicated next to each question below.
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