The ethics of academic research

Ethical research is paramount to the validity of my work.  Ethics comes in two large packages.  The first is the ethics of original work.  This manifests itself in finding genuine data – rather than inventing research findings and presenting it as the result of a genuine research programme – and in avoiding plagiarism, that is the appropriation of other people’s work and passing it off as one’s own.

The second big aspect of ethics is the treatment of research subjects.  These are the people who are asked to provide information to researchers. Universities provide copious guidance on the ethical treatment of research subjects.  I initially found this to be unexpectedly robust and, I eventually realised, intended for practitioners of medical, psychological and other forms of potentially invasive research.  STILL AND ALL, I need to apply ethical standards to my research even if the data sought from individuals concern an organisation rather than the person.  Specifically,

• your participation in a research study is voluntary.
• I provide information explaining my research, its aims and processes.
• All data obtained in my research is anonymized and personal confidentiality is assured.  See below on what this means.
• All data is stored securely using Trinity’s Qualtrics licence.  And see below for more re Qualtrics.
• Data is never, ever, shared with or (heaven forbid) sold to third parties.

More about research ethics is available to read here:  TCD Business school and research ethics.

What do we mean by anonymized research?  In our current study, we will be able to track responses and link them to specific organisations.  This is so that we can (a) match you to your organisation’s Benefacts entry and so reduce the amount of data that you provide, (b) follow up respondents and (c) invite a sample to interviews for the final stage of research.  HOWEVER, all data is analysed anonymously, i.e. individual respondents or their organisations will not be identified.  All results will be published with anonymized data.

The Trinity Business School is able to offer this reassurance by virtue of our research practices and also because we are holding the research data securely on Qualtrics.  This is third party research software that is used by business and academia; their security statement is here.