Dear colleagues,
RE: ETHICS APPROVAL IN JOURNALISM DEPARTMENTS
I would be very interested to hear how other Universities with
journalism departments manage the department's activities with respect
to research ethics and ethics review procedures.
Here at the University of Sheffield, we have a Department of Journalism
Studies which teaches professional practice in journalism, in addition
to undertaking research. The Department has raised a query with respect
to the applicability of the University's Ethics Review Procedure for
some of its activities - in particular, students going out to obtain
news stories as part of their learning activities. The University has a
broad definition of research ('all investigation undertaken in order to
acquire knowledge and understanding'), so these activities could be
considered as research activities requiring ethics approval.
However, this does not sit well with the nature of journalistic
activity, since it is often impossible to know what news story will come
up in advance, and once a story breaks, journalists must move fast to
investigate and publish the story (i.e. it would be impossible to
produce a meaningful ethics application and seek approval in advance of
such activity). In addition, certain ethical principles are not seen to
be appropriate or reasonable in most cases in the journalism industry,
such as obtaining consent from interviewees.
In order to advise our Department of Journalism Studies on this issue,
it would be very helpful to hear whether colleagues in other
Universities have come across similar issues, and if so how these have
been addressed.
Kind regards
Lindsay
--
Mrs Lindsay Unwin
Quality Support and Regulations Officer
Quality and Governance Team
Research and Innovation Services
Academic Services
The University of Sheffield
New Spring House
231 Glossop Road
Sheffield
S10 2GW
Tel: 0114 2221443
http://www.shef.ac.uk/ris
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