Great Ethical Divides: Bridging the Gap Between Institutional Review Boards and Researchers

Abstract

This article addresses the difficulties that educational ethnographers and qualitative researchers have experienced with what appear to be great ethical divides between their research approaches and the approval processes of institutional review boards. The author begins with a brief discussion of ethical issues involving human subjects in education research, then explains the divides as largely a consequence of different ethical frameworks and orientations toward applications of the basic ethical principles of respect for persons, beneficence, and justice. She also discusses the challenges of bureaucratic arrangements established to ensure federal compliance. She concludes with strategies for bridging the divides, with emphasis on the importance of representation, communication, education, and practical academic acumen.

Research ethics committees: values and power in higher education

“…Evident through standardised approaches admonished from the top in relation to institutional governance, they are manifest through practices relating to teaching standards and in committees such as Research Ethics Committees. The current approach offers a process that is deemed less than satisfactory; some would even question whether it is ethical (van den Hoonard 2002; Lincoln and Tierney 2004;Hemmings 2006;Hammersley 2009). RECs, while typically comprising academic staff, meet requirements set centrally by university administrators.…”

“…A particular problem with the REC framework is that it has been heavily influenced by the natural sciences, particularly medical research (Hemmings, 2006;Tolich and Fitzgerald, 2006;Connolly and Reid, 2007). Consequently one of the problems for social scientists is that RECs are premised on positivist epistemology (Yearley, 2005).…”

“…Qualitative social science thus does not include a completely predetermined research design at an early stage (Truman, 2003;Connolly and Reid, 2007); ethics are situational and emerge through social relations; they are not something to be judged from a distance as a one-off endeavour (Rossiter et al, 2000;Hemmings, 2006;Armbruster, 2008). At worst, changes to research design can lead to multiple REC submissions; methodological inconsistencies; time lost and costs incurred; and, in extreme cases, complete abandonment of research (van den Hoonaard, 2001;Richardson and McMullan, 2007;Munro, 2008).…”

When and How Qualitative Methods Provide Credible and Actionable Evidence : Reasoning With Rigor, Probity, and Transparency

“…Finally, the principle of justice ensures that both selection and receipt of benefit should be equitable and that procedures are nonexploitative. Only through a morally reasoned relationship between the evaluator and the participants can the dimensions, parameters, and expectations of these principles be ethically defined, negotiated, and shared (see, for example, Hemmings, 2006;Rallis, 2010;Rallis, Rossman, & Gajda (2007); and Rossman & Rallis, 2010 for further discussion of ethical practice and moral principles).…”

‘That is NOT what's happening at Horizon!’: ethics and misrepresenting knowledge in text

“…(Guillemin and Gillam 2004, 271) Within the research relationship, then, practical tensions are present: harm and burden versus respect and benefit. Avoiding harm (physical, emotional, or social) is basic (Guillemin and Gillam 2004), and bearing undue burden may be harmful (see Hemmings 2006). However, in qualitative research, potentials for harm 'are often quite subtle and stem from the nature of the interaction between researcher and participant' (Guillemin and Gillam 2004, 272).…”