The ethical concerns about risks that arise during human subjects research can also be relevant to other activities, such as methods classes and program evaluations. The following is a compilation of major ethical issues that can arise, along with some of the ways social scientists and others try to deal with them. The list is not a policy or set of rules, merely an educational resource for people interested in the topic.
Risks Can be Reduced if They Are Anticipated
Even if something does not at first glance seem very risky, it’s worth thinking in advance about everything that could go wrong. Reducing risks to zero is of course impossible, because everyday life itself involves numerous things that can produce discomfort or harm, but it is good practice to reduce any risks that you can. Thinking about possible worst-case scenarios can also bring up things you wouldn't have thought of otherwise, allowing you to at least develop contingency plans.
Risks Can be Psychological and Social as Well as Physical
Some activities present obvious physical risks, such as falling off a treadmill during exercise, having an allergic reaction to something, or suffering an epileptic seizure in response to flashing images. For these kinds of thing you may want to consider giving appropriate warnings, screening out some potential participants, and making yourself aware of emergency response resources.
Other activities might present less obvious psychological or emotional risks, such as becoming upset by discussing particular topics, remembering traumatic experiences when asked about them, or being traumatized anew by unpleasant stresses or surprises. Warnings and screening can again be useful here, as well as making sure people know they can stop participating at any point.
Some activities also involve social, legal, or economic risks. These can be the hardest risks to notice, and they often arise from issues of privacy and confidentiality. For example, if someone admits to something embarrassing, stigmatizing, or even illegal in a survey or interview, it is good to make sure that this information is not publicized against the person's wishes. Being 'outed' for things like having a drug addiction, being of a particular religious faith, or having critical opinions of people in power, can lead to social isolation, persecution, job loss, or worse. Section 3 below will discuss some ways of reducing these kinds of risk.
Social risks can affect not just individuals, but also larger social groups and communities. For example, if a study finds that a small town has an unusually high rate of alcoholism, publicizing this fact could lead to stigmatization of everyone living there. When there is a potential for this kind of problem, it can be a good idea to involve members of the relevant community themselves in planning and conducting the activity.
Finally, there can also be a risk of people feeling coerced into taking part in a project. If volunteers are involved, it is good to make sure that they really do want to take part, and are not just doing so because they think someone with power over them (e.g. employers, doctors, or teachers) want them to. For this reason it is always worth looking for a way to recruit volunteers directly, rather than with the knowledge of anyone else.
Risks Can Arise at Different Stages of an Activity
Physical and Psychological risks mainly arise during an activity itself, although in some cases their effects may only become known later. For social risks however, especially those concerning privacy and confidentiality, there can be problems before, during, and after the main activity.
Social problems can arise before an activity if subjects (or even just potential subjects) are 'outed' by particular recruitment methods. You might be able to get hold of a list of people with certain features you are interested in, but you should be careful how you go about communicating with them. Someone who is HIV positive, for example, may not appreciate a letter discussing the fact being sent to their home address. A different problem could arise if you asked a boss to nominate employees for an interview project. This is usually not a good idea, because the boss might subsequently retaliate against those employees if the project reveals high levels of worker dissatisfaction. Just as with the problem of coercion discussed above, it is usually worth figuring out a way to recruit people directly and privately rather than involving others.
Similar privacy problems can arise during an activity itself. For example, it would be problematic to conduct interviews with patients about hospital conditions in the hospital itself, in a location where staff might see them happening. It is usually a good idea therefore to conduct sensitive interviews in a private space, or somewhere the interviewee thinks is safe from prying eyes.
Another kind of social risk arises during joint interviews or focus groups. Here it can be good to remind participants that their words won’t be completely confidential, because other people are right there listening to them. Given this problem, it can be hard to safely cover sensitive topics using these methods.
Finally, breaches of confidentiality can create significant social problems even after a study's main activity has concluded. If interview recordings, surveys, observations, or samples contain sensitive information they ought to be stored in a secure way. If possible, it is also worth storing sensitive materials separately from individual identifiers like names and addresses. In some cases this can be done by completely divorcing the data from the identifiers so that they can never be put back together. In other cases (for example when you want to keep track of who’s who for later follow-ups) the data can be stored with codes attached, and a master list of codes connected to names stored on a separate file.
In some cases however it is simply not possible to fully separate sensitive information from individual identifiers. This is obviously the case for audio and visual recordings where specific individuals could be readily identified, but it can also be true for interview transcripts and detailed notes from observations of daily activities. In these cases, details in the very data themselves can potentially reveal who people are, so simply taking their names off will not be enough. It can then be all the more important to consider encrypting and password-protecting the resulting records.
The issue of detailed data can also create social risks at the stage where results are reported. Sometimes these risks can be mitigated by only reporting results in aggregate, for example saying that 10% of students disliked their professors, rather than breaking things down in such detail that you can figure out which students were talking about which teachers. In other cases however it might be important to report particular instances of individual responses, for example to illustrate the different ways people talk about things. One common way of dealing with this is to omit or change irrelevant details when providing quotes, again so that it is less likely a specific person could be identified. Overall, the general principle here is to be careful never to attribute so many details to a given participant (or category of participants) that someone could figure out exactly who they really are. It should be noted however that this is harder the more specific the topic involved, and the smaller the pool of possible participants. A set of interviews with ex-Presidents of the United States about their experiences with war, for example, would be very hard to report without effectively revealing who said what.
Risks Are Not The Same For Everybody
In addition to thinking about possible risks, it is important to remember that some people will be more vulnerable than others. People with particular physical conditions may be especially sensitive to some dangers - for example people with heart disease asked to engage in strenuous exercise, or pregnant women asked to engage in stressful activities. It is worth thinking about these in advance, and potentially screening out some people before the activity starts.
Some people may also feel more coerced to participate than others. As noted above, employees or students in certain situations may feel pressured by their employers/teachers. Similarly, people like prisoners, inpatients, and nursing home residents must all be recruited especially carefully to make sure they do not fear retaliation for refusing to take part. The confidentiality of data from these people must also be especially well guarded to make sure that no retaliation actually occurs in response to what they say or do.
In addition to this, social groups that already face stigmatization or discrimination may be especially hurt by breaches of confidentiality, or by findings that lead to further negative stereotypes. As noted above, it may even be best to collaborate with representatives of these groups throughout the project in order to deal with this possibility.
A final consideration is the vulnerability of people who may not be able to fully understand what is happening. Sometimes this may be an issue of language proficiency, which may mean that interpretation and translation resources are a necessary part of some projects. Children and cognitively impaired people are also often screened out of projects entirely, but if they are necessary participants, this should be planned accordingly, and permission obtained not just from the individuals themselves, but also from their parents, guardians, or legally authorized representatives.
People Should Know What They're Getting Into
When you know the risks involved in an activity, plus any ways you are going to reduce them, it is worth passing this information on to the people involved, along with a description of what they will be asked to do. If you are asking for volunteers, it is good to make sure they are choosing to participate of their own free will, and from a position of being fully informed.
One exception to this is when an activity necessarily involves a harmless deception. However, in this case it can still be important to finish fully informing people after the activity is over - for example by debriefing them about a psychology experiment that pretended to study one aspect of their behavior, in order to be able to study another.
If you want to get people's consent to participate, it is important to use language that they will understand. As noted above, this can involve using an interpreter, or translating written materials appropriately. It is also worth considering educational level, and avoiding words or technical terms that not everyone will understand.
In all cases the particular context can have a big influence. People might not be able to choose responsibly if they are asked to make a participation decision when they do not have the time or attention to consider things carefully enough. The time and attention required may be minimal for simple, low-risk projects, but it typically increases as a project becomes more elaborate, risky/sensitive, and time-consuming.
Finally, as noted above, it is definitely good to ask children and cognitively-impaired people if they want to participate, but they still may not fully understand the situation. It can be important therefore to also obtain the permission of their parents, guardians, or legally authorized representatives.
There May be a Number of Rules, Laws, and Community Standards to Consider
Relevant rules and standards exist at a number of different levels.
Federal law for example controls the use of educational information (via FERPA), the collection of material concerning sexuality, politics, and other sensitive topics at the K-12 level (when funded by the Department of Education, via PPRA), and the use of medical records (via HIPAA). Anything involving these things must follow the relevant regulations.
At the same time, state laws define the legal age of majority (which can determine when parental permission is required for some things), the legality of marijuana (which affects how risky it is to admit smoking, buying, or growing pot), and the legal drinking age. They also include mandatory reporting laws for things like child and elder abuse. Local laws in turn define the legality of other behaviors that might be revealed by a project, for example buying alcohol. All these things are worth considering when planning a project.
Institutions and organizations also have rules that may need to be taken into account. Most businesses, schools, and colleges will not allow people to come onto their property and start surveying people without permission. Most internet forums have rules about whether members are allowed to recruit people for projects, and if so, how that is done.
Finally, on a less formal level it is always a good idea to consider community norms, expectations, and standards when involving people in a project. These may have to do with the way you arrange a project (should it have been discussed with a particular community beforehand?), the way you handle potentially sensitive topics (did you not realize something was especially controversial?), or even the language you use (do you say something that implies you are ignorant of important issues?). This is not just a question of ethics, but also of getting good results. If you unnecessarily offend people, or make them think you are careless or foolish, you may reduce the likelihood that they will take your project seriously. You may also reduce the likelihood that they will participate in future projects arranged by you, or by anyone else associated with Michigan Tech.