Ethics reviewers have moved on from granite-faced bureaucracy

Anyone who works in higher education knows that those responsible for research ethics are not popular everywhere.

Undoubtedly, the very words “research ethics” conjure up images of granite-faced bureaucrats obsessed with unrelenting rules and micromanagement in some minds. Humanities scholars in particular have complained that ethical requirements are imposing a clinical model on them that is better suited to health research.

I’ve worked in a research ethics bureau for more than a decade, and I don’t want to deny that some of the criticisms are valid. Nevertheless, research ethics had to move with the times in a turbulent time in which we had to contend with the consequences of the financial crash, the emergence of populism, Brexit and Covid – and many assumptions about it are now outdated.

Reviewers for research ethics have a central purpose: to represent the interests of research participants who make their time and data available. I like to think my institution is at the top, but a cursory look at other universities’ websites reveals a lot of common practice. Many have put in place online ethics filing systems to avoid the need to destroy more rainforest. This has the great advantage that verification processes are accelerated and thus made more efficient.

It is also clear that university research ethics has become increasingly professional through the hiring of specialist staff like me. Nowadays, for example, applications are usually checked proportionally according to their degree of risk. A student interviewing shopping brands probably won’t have to fill out a monstrously long and complicated form. Presumably they will also be spared their epistemology being torn apart by a committee of high-ranking lecturers.

There’s a reason we’ve seen such professionalization – universities talk to each other. This is how they find out how to react to pressure from the outside world. For example, the UK Research Integrity Office and the Association of Research Managers and Administrators have jointly published guidelines to promote common standards for ethics reviews. This guide provides for review procedures that are “consistent, coherent and well-informed”. To achieve this, reviewers and policy makers need to be reflective and open to new ideas. It involves dialogue with the researchers, not top-down imposition.

One area where research ethics needed refinement is in social media. When I started my job, Twitter wasn’t even a thing. Data in the public domain was considered fair game and is not the responsibility of a research ethics committee. It’s true that tweets and Instagram posts are often as publicly available as online news articles. However, social media users are typically private individuals and are not subject to the restrictions imposed on journalists, so it is not appropriate for them to adhere to the same standards.

Over the course of a decade of roller coaster, it became apparent that social media held an unrecognized cultural and political power. Posts that were controversial, thoughtless or even completely harmless often had unexpected consequences. Like the rest of the world, universities have had to catch up, and there has been industry-wide debate about the ethics of social media research.

After some struggle, many universities developed guidelines that took complexity and nuances into account. Some institutions now insist on the ethical review of projects that analyze social media. Others merely encourage researchers to consider users’ interests. Other important considerations include local data management policies and security sensitivities, particularly those related to terrorism. Even if a uniform approach has not yet emerged, the common feeling is palpable that the proverbial spirit is out of the bottle and that we have to tackle the problems systematically.

Another incentive to professionalize research ethics was the need for a quick response. A typical example are the far-reaching requirements of the General Data Protection Regulation with its endless effects on consent and data storage. Academics needed practical advice from people with work knowledge. Similarly, research ethics experts at Covid have had to adapt with haste and agility. On the one hand, the pandemic has cryogenically frozen many personal studies. On the other hand, it has created a hectic demand for new research, much of which is in urgent need of revision.

I strongly believe that having to fill out an ethics form is beneficial for researchers. After trying it out myself, I know it’s not a particularly pleasant experience, even as the forms become more user-friendly. Still, it encourages researchers to pause and think about their participants. For example, are references to “neoliberal paradigms” on information sheets for children age-appropriate? The application process also gives researchers the opportunity to explain their projects in an amateur way. In a university landscape where the dreaded framework for research excellence is constantly emerging, this could be a kind of survivability.

In the last 10 years, the university research ethics processes have developed considerably. The relationship between reviewers and researchers has also changed. Should I say that it is now completely harmonious, even symbiotic? Well, maybe not quite, but we’re getting there. However, I am confident that research ethics will continue to evolve and will remain so.

James Patterson is Research Ethics Facilitator at King’s College London. The views expressed here are his own and not necessarily those of his employer.

source https://collegeeducationnewsllc.com/ethics-reviewers-have-moved-on-from-granite-faced-bureaucracy/