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Book part
Publication date: 19 April 2018

David Carpenter

In this chapter I build upon the case I argued in Volume 1 of this series (Carpenter, D. (2016). The quest for generic ethical principles in social science research. In R. Iphofen…

Abstract

In this chapter I build upon the case I argued in Volume 1 of this series (Carpenter, D. (2016). The quest for generic ethical principles in social science research. In R. Iphofen (Ed.), Advances in research ethics and integrity (Vol. 1, pp. 3–18). Bingley: Emerald). There I established arguments for eschewing principlism and other well-established theories of practical ethics, such as deontology and consequentialism, in favour of virtue ethics. I drew on the work of Macfarlane (2009, 2010) in making a case for virtuous researcher and virtuous research. In this chapter, I draw attention to the role and conduct of ethics committees in reviewing research. If we are to consider the ethics of research and researchers, then we might also consider the ethics of reviewing and reviewers. Whilst there is an abundance of codes and similar documents aimed at guiding research conduct, there is relatively little to guide ethics committees and their members. Given the argument that a virtue ethics approach might help committees evaluate the ethics of proposed research and researchers, it could equally be the case that virtue ethics could be useful when thinking about the work of committees and ethics review. In this chapter I attempt to relocate and develop Macfarlane’s work by examining its application to the work of ethics committees and the virtues of their members. In particular, I will consider the virtues that reviewers should exhibit or demonstrate when reviewing research, and what we might take as the telos of ethics committees.

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Virtue Ethics in the Conduct and Governance of Social Science Research
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78714-608-2

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Book part
Publication date: 19 April 2018

Helen Brown Coverdale

The chapter reflects on the strengths and limitations of David Carpenter’s proposal to support the work of research ethics committees through consideration of the virtues required…

Abstract

The chapter reflects on the strengths and limitations of David Carpenter’s proposal to support the work of research ethics committees through consideration of the virtues required by their members. Carpenter’s approach has many strengths, responsibilising researchers and ethics committees, and increasing the scope for robust and active theoretical engagement with ethical issues. I bring two alternative perspectives on research ethics to bear on this discussion. First, I discuss work in care ethics and relational ethics, approaches to ethics that have some similarities with virtue ethics but also distinct differences. Bruce Macfarlane’s text, on which Carpenter draws, notes care ethics briefly. I offer a more detailed consideration of what this perspective can offer, both for research ethics and for the virtuous research ethics committee. This helps to identify the relationships that are missing from a virtue ethics focus. Further, a context sensitive relational approach suggests ways in which we can strengthen Carpenter’s proposals to help research ethics committees select between competing principles or virtues. Second, my research ethics expertise is in undergraduate teaching for a multidisciplinary course, and an enquiry-based learning programme, which allows students in mixed discipline groups to plan, conduct, report and present their own original social research. The research skills training provided includes an interactive introduction to research ethics, what they are for and why they matter. Since we aim to offer practical guidance to research ethics committees when they consider what they should do and how this should be done, such a first principles approach may be useful.

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Virtue Ethics in the Conduct and Governance of Social Science Research
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78714-608-2

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Book part
Publication date: 23 November 2020

Marleah Blom and Miranda D’Amico

This chapter centers on practices of Review Ethics Board (REBs) as they may impact academic freedom for faculty members acting as participants in research. A case example is…

Abstract

This chapter centers on practices of Review Ethics Board (REBs) as they may impact academic freedom for faculty members acting as participants in research. A case example is provided, which highlights the authors’ experience applying for ethics clearance to conduct a qualitative research study. While the study was classified as minimal risk and received ethics clearance from the researchers’ host institution, additional research ethics applications were required from the higher education settings identified, before being able to recruit participants. In addition to pressing timelines, extra workload and the coordination of different requirements for each institution, not all REBs permitted faculty members the option to reveal their identity and their beliefs on pedagogical practices. This particular experience with the ethics review process elicited questions centering on research ethics committees’ practices in terms of (a) providing opportunities for faculty members, as participants in research, to freely share information about their beliefs and teaching practices as well as (b) infringing on faculty members’ autonomy and rights to intellectually express, share and take ownership of their personal beliefs and pedagogical approaches to teaching in higher education.

Book part
Publication date: 15 February 2017

Will C. van den Hoonaard

Formal research ethics codes perpetuate imbalances between ethics regulators and researchers in the social sciences. Some of these imbalances are an outcome of ethics regimes that…

Abstract

Formal research ethics codes perpetuate imbalances between ethics regulators and researchers in the social sciences. Some of these imbalances are an outcome of ethics regimes that use the biomedical paradigm when evaluating social science research. The bureaucratic nature in the manner by which ethics committees operate is yet another factor that produces imbalances that reshape social scientific enquiry. This chapter, however, underscores some of the less recognised ways that ethics codes produce a disequilibrium. First, ethics codes require, in effect, that researchers in the social sciences ‘other’ themselves at the expenses of their traditional stock of social scientific methodology by seeing themselves through the eyes of the colonising ethics codes. Second, ethics codes insist that researchers need to exemplify a far larger number of virtues than the very few set aside for members of ethics review committees. Ethics regimes place social scientists on the margins of the ethics world: the regime not only colonises them, but also insists that they hold on to virtues that are quite absent with respect to members of ethics committees.

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Finding Common Ground: Consensus in Research Ethics Across the Social Sciences
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78714-130-8

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Book part
Publication date: 25 July 2015

Boris Handal, Kevin Watson, Marc Fellman, Marguerite Maher and Miya White

This paper examines beliefs and attitudes in the context of how they influence the decisions of university Human Research Ethics Committees (HRECs) as a preface to undertaking an…

Abstract

This paper examines beliefs and attitudes in the context of how they influence the decisions of university Human Research Ethics Committees (HRECs) as a preface to undertaking an empirical study in this area. It also aims at establishing a conceptual framework to guide the design of a questionnaire targeting beliefs about research ethics and the implications of these beliefs on review practices of HREC members throughout Australia.

Using content analysis of the extant body of the literature the paper examines the relationship between the concepts of beliefs and knowledge, beliefs and attitudes, and among beliefs, attitudes and behaviour in the context of research ethics.

The discussion suggests that ethics approval practices can, at times, be influenced more by personal beliefs than by contemporary review standards. It is also suggested that personal beliefs can be transmitted through the review process and that HRECs can serve to influence the transfer of values from reviewers to researchers.

The framework that this paper presents has the potential to appraise an array of perspectives which in turn would guide the design of professional development programs. In addition, an improved, more nuanced understanding of how HREC members make ethical decisions will positively impact and inform best practice in the review of ethical applications for research projects.

The paper presents a novel theoretical framework underpinning research ethics reviewer beliefs and attitudes within a contemporary context.

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Conscience, Leadership and the Problem of ‘Dirty Hands’
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78560-203-0

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Book part
Publication date: 19 October 2020

Lorena Gibson, O. Ripeka Mercier and Rebecca Kiddle

In this chapter, we draw upon our experiences as members of Victoria University of Wellington’s Human Ethics Committee (VUW-HEC) to discuss some of the issues that arise when…

Abstract

In this chapter, we draw upon our experiences as members of Victoria University of Wellington’s Human Ethics Committee (VUW-HEC) to discuss some of the issues that arise when researchers are asked to discuss the Treaty of Waitangi1 in ethics applications. Victoria University of Wellington (VUW)’s Human Ethics Policy states that researchers have a responsibility to ensure that research conforms to the University’s Treaty of Waitangi Statute. This statute outlines the principle-based framework VUW has adopted to meet its obligations to the Treaty derived from the Education Act 1989 and other non-statutory sources. Accompanying the Human Ethics Policy is a Human Ethics Guidelines document providing researchers at VUW with information about how they can align their research with Treaty principles, such as those of partnership, protection, and participation. Researchers are encouraged to read these documents before completing the ethics application, which contains a mandatory question asking them to explain how their research conforms to the University’s Treaty of Waitangi Statute. During our time on VUW-HEC, we have observed that this question can be difficult for researchers to engage with in a meaningful way. In this chapter, we do not discuss the specifics of applications or VUW-HEC meetings; instead, we draw on our collective experiences to consider how well our university’s ethics application process creates space for researchers to engage with ‘that Treaty question’.

Details

Indigenous Research Ethics: Claiming Research Sovereignty Beyond Deficit and the Colonial Legacy
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78769-390-6

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Article
Publication date: 3 August 2021

Diana Lorenzo-Afable, Smita Singh and Marjolein Lips-Wiersma

This paper examines the ethical tensions in social entrepreneurship (SE) research by focusing on the ethical consequences of obtaining ethics approval in a university in the…

Abstract

Purpose

This paper examines the ethical tensions in social entrepreneurship (SE) research by focusing on the ethical consequences of obtaining ethics approval in a university in the developed world while executing fieldwork for data collection in a developing country. It aims to offer insight into ethical research practice to protect vulnerable research participants from being further silenced and marginalised by the dominant social order that developed world universities embody.

Design/methodology/approach

The ethical tensions are described through narratives drawn from a Filipino Ph.D. candidate's experience. The candidate obtained ethics approval from the university in New Zealand and collected interview data from social enterprise beneficiaries in the Philippines. A critical reflexive lens carves a space for a deepened understanding of these ethical tensions.

Findings

This paper offers critical insights into ethical SE research involving participants from vulnerable communities. These insights suggest that closer consideration needs to be given to contextual sensitivity, particularly on the part of researchers and research ethics committees, in crafting ethical data collection protocols. Findings also show how it is important for the indigenous researcher to filter ethical protocols through their local knowledge.

Originality/value

The paper uses critical reflexivity to examine ethical tensions in SE research involving vulnerable beneficiaries. It offers insights into ethical research procedures and practices that engender mindfulness of the contextual and relational aspects of doing SE research in the developing world.

Details

Qualitative Research in Organizations and Management: An International Journal, vol. 16 no. 3/4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1746-5648

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 4 March 2014

Bart Johnson

– The purpose of this paper is to explore ethical issues associated with using the shadowing method.

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Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to explore ethical issues associated with using the shadowing method.

Design/methodology/approach

Ethical issues that arose during a 12-week shadowing study that examined the work activities and practices of Canadian healthcare CEOs are discussed.

Findings

Dividing the ethics process into two phases – those addressed by ethics committees (procedural ethics) and those that revealed themselves in the field (ethics in practice) – issues and relating to sampling, informed consent, researcher roles, objectivity, participant discomforts, the impact of research on participants, confidentiality, and anonymity are investigated. This paper illustrates that while useful, procedural ethics committees are unable to establish ethical practice in and of themselves. In response, it suggests that the concept of reflexivity be applied to ethics to help researchers consider the implications of using the shadowing method, and develop a contingency for possible challenges, before they enter the field.

Practical implications

This paper provides researchers considering using the shadowing method with critical insights into some of the ethical issues associated with the method. A number of questions are posed and a number of suggestions offered as to how ethical practice can be attained in the field. Given practice-based similarities between shadowing and other qualitative methodologies such as participant observation and ethnography, many of the lessons derived from this case study are also pertinent to researchers using other techniques to examine organizational and management phenomenon.

Originality/value

Building on the formal and critical discussion about the shadowing method ignited by McDonald (2005), this paper identifies and discusses ethical issues associated with the shadowing method that have not been examined in either ethics or research methods literature.

Details

Qualitative Research in Organizations and Management: An International Journal, vol. 9 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1746-5648

Keywords

Content available
Book part
Publication date: 15 February 2017

Abstract

Details

Finding Common Ground: Consensus in Research Ethics Across the Social Sciences
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78714-130-8

Content available
Book part
Publication date: 15 February 2017

Abstract

Details

Finding Common Ground: Consensus in Research Ethics Across the Social Sciences
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78714-130-8

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