Hi,
I have a lot of sympathy with Iain Chalmers' arguments about
bioethics. He has suggested that, at least in health, ethics
committees should be evaluated as a public health intervention and if
found to do more harm (e.g. impeding research) than good (e.g.
stopping bad trials) then they should be banned!
I think I would feel uncomfortable with the offering of easy academic
credit for participation in research but only if there were a
realistic prospect that the research might harm the participant or no
prospect of useful information being derived from the study. Otherwise
this seems like a sensible arrangement with researchers gaining access
to subjects and students potentially learning from their participation
in others' studies.
It is very easy to lose sight of what we are trying to achieve among
reams of bioethics doctrine and regulations.
Best wishes,
Tom
On 19 October 2012 02:04, Amy Price <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Hi All,
>
> At the university I formerly attended all projects under grad and post grad
> had to be pre-approved by the IRB. We were instructed re ethics/limitations.
> If a proposal was submitted that violated ethics it was a fail. If one
> changed the project after the proposal (fail). If you wanted to do something
> that strayed from the norm but still was within ethical boundaries one had
> to supply written justification to the research committee and submit to a
> mini viva. If your proposal was rejected you had to take whatever canned
> project was left over. We were forbidden to use participants we did not have
> signed consents for and we were called upon to produce the consent forms.
> Extra credit or renumeration was never offered. I got in trouble 2x, once
> for suggesting that our team collaborate on the 'perfect' paper, share the
> stats data and turn it in as a group of equal contributors and for enrolling
> the rented universities staff and townspeople so we could get a reasonable
> sample size.
>
> Students were expected to cooperate in each others projects during research
> weeks. Showing up and participating was mandatory but you could choose which
> projects you participated in. We were marked on pre
> planning/proposal/ethics/ and writing up. We were not marked on how we got
> along with our team members. This atmosphere made getting a publishable
> project challenging but it was fair to everyone with no coercion. We were
> told before the class sign up what the expectations were. I don't think
> expecting mutual collaboration is coercive.
>
> If post docs or staff had research they wanted help with they were expected
> to contact individuals after classes etc and were not permitted to use the
> forums to proselytize .
>
> Best,
> Amy
>
> From: "Stephen M Perle DC, MS" <[log in to unmask]>
> Reply-To: "Stephen M Perle DC, MS" <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Thursday, October 18, 2012 8:15 PM
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Subject: Re: Ethics question
>
> Jane,
>
> I just stepped down after ~10 years as the chair of the IRB at the
> University of Bridgeport. We had this specific issue come up a few years
> ago. A study that among other aspects asked students to fill out an
> anonymous questionnaire and in lieu of that students could write an essay
> during that class period. This was rejected by the IRB as coercive. We
> were told by the PI that it is common for psychology programs to require
> students to participate in research. There was unanimous agreement that
> this was coercive to require participation (how could it be other than
> coercive participate or don't graduate). We likewise discussed the idea of
> extra credit and concluded that this too is a form of coercion.
>
> I highly recommend the book "My Freshman Year" by Rebecca Nathan (a
> pseudonym for the anthropologist Cathy Small). Dr. Small realized after 20
> years in higher education that she didn't understand her students and
> therefore as an anthropologist decided to study them by becoming a freshman,
> living in a freshman dorm and taking a full load of 100 level classes at her
> own university.(some question the ethics of HER study) She noted, in the
> past a prof would suggest a paper and students would read it and be
> interested in talking about it. One of the things she discovered was that
> today if there is no grade consequence students will rarely do more than the
> minimum, in any but the subjects they really think are important and love.
> Thus, extra credit could be more coercive than financial incentives.
>
> Stephen
>
> Stephen M. Perle, D.C., M.S.
>
> Associate Editor, Chiropractic & Manual Therapies
>
> Professor of Clinical Sciences
> University of Bridgeport, Bridgeport, CT 06604 USA
> www.bridgeport.edu/~perle
>
> Chiropractic & Manual Therapies chiromt.com
>
> _____________________________________________
> “True genius resides in the capacity for evaluation of
> uncertain and conflicting information.”
> - Winston Churchill
>
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