Ben Van Den Assem & Dan Remenyi 
Ethics Protocols and Research Ethics Committees : Successfully Obtaining Approval for your Research [EPUB ebook] 
Successfully Obtaining Approval for your Research

This book addresses Ethics Protocols related to Masters, Doctoral and other Research which will be conducted under the auspices of a univer-sity or similar institution.

Conducting academic research to the highest ethical standards is essen-tial for both the researcher personally and the university or institution at which he or she is working. If the highest standards of ethical behaviour are not maintained then the researcher and the university or institution can easily fall into disrepute.

In recent years it has become more challenging to conduct quality aca-demic research. There are several reasons for this, one of which is the need to have Ethics Protocol approval before the research can begin.

The issue of ethics is ubiquitous in academic research. Some universities claim that all research raises ethical issues, although it is difficult to see how such a blanket claim could be correct. University codes of ethics can be extensive, addressing issues such as what should be and should not be researched; how the research should be conducted; how researchers should work with each other; how the research should be written up, to mention only a few issues.

Universities have become more conscious of ethical issues and more concerned about their responsibilities in this respect. To this end nu-merous Research Ethics Committees (RECs) and research ethics policies and procedures have been set up.

Although each university has its own procedures with respect to Ethic Committees and how a researcher can obtain ethics approval for his or her research, they generally follow the same basic principles.

This book discusses the background to the need for Ethic Protocols and Ethic Committees and describes the way permission is obtained and provides useful advice about how to cope with the Ethics Protocol ap-proval process.

It is important to note that there is much more to the subject of aca-demic ethics than is addressed in this book. There are many sources of advice about how research should be conducted in the most ethical fashion. This book provides advice in dealing with the REC which increasingly research students and degree candidates need to address. It is also important to bear in mind that outside of the medical faculties, the need for ethics approval is relatively new for universities and that universities are in the process of finding their way through what is a complex set of issues.