Ethics in Research with Human Participants / Edition 1

by Bruce Dennis Sales, Susan Folkman

Overview

In the past decade, dramatic shifts have taken place in the contexts in which research occurs. Changes in research questions, populations, methods, and society's norms have generated new ethical challenges for researchers. In response to these challenges, the American Psychological Association offers this book to help researchers understand the new world of ethics. Ethics in Research With Human Participants is an educational, advisory resource that promotes scientific rigor within an ethical context. Throughout, it emphasizes practical solutions to e thical problems. The larger aspects of managing the research process are also covered, including training researchers, dealing with authors hip and intellectual property issues, working with special populations , updating protocols for institutional review boards, and managing matters of informed consent, privacy, and confidentiality. This book is a must for keeping up with the ever-shifting lines of ethical boundaries.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781557986887
Publisher:	American Psychological Association
Publication date:	07/28/2000
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	215
Product dimensions:	7.03(w) x 9.98(h) x 0.63(d)

Editorial Reviews

Reviewer: Scott Levine, MD (Rush University Medical Center)
Description: This book is the result of a task force of the American Psychological Association.
Purpose: The task force was charged "to address newly emerging ethical issues in the conduct of research with human participants and to create an educational, advisory document that would promote scientific rigor within an ethical context and suggest practical solutions to ethical dilemmas."
Audience: According to the authors, this document is geared toward "undergraduates, graduates, faculty, basic and applied researchers in psychology and other disciplines involving human participants, and institutional review boards." However, this book rarely addresses the ethical dilemmas present in research that are not purely psychological in nature. For example, ethical dilemmas dealing with the risks and benefits of providing medical treatment are only briefly discussed. Thus, this book may not provide the depth that is needed in order to satisfy readers who conduct or ethically evaluate research that is not related to non-medical basic psychology.
Features: Essentially, this book consists of a main text, followed by appendixes containing the complete copies of the APA Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct, the Code of Federal Regulations for the Protection of Human Subjects, and the Belmont Report. The main text, consisting of 128 pages, summarizes the moral foundations of ethical research, considerations researchers should make in planning their research (including issues of consent, privacy and confidentiality), the importance of maintaining subjects' trust and safety during studies, and a brief discussion of how to balance conflicting ethical objectives.
Assessment: Given the length of this book, it becomes impossible to cover any of these topics in great depth and, thus, it serves more as a brief review. It may be useful for a beginning psychological researchers so that they may recognize some of the more common ethical dilemmas encountered. However, once these ethical dilemmas are recognized, readers will have to look elsewhere to understand these dilemmas' history and meaning, or to assess how such dilemmas have been resolved in the past.

Doody's Review Service

3 Stars from Doody