Research Ethics and Obligations

Research in the social sciences frequently involves gathering data from people. This, in many instances, raises questions about how researchers should treat the people who provide them data; these questions generally relate to research ethics. In essence, research ethics is concerned with preventing physical, psychological, financial, or any other kind of harm during a research study, which of course is particularly important if your research involves human participants.

At its most basic, ethics is defined in the Merriam-Webster online dictionary as “the discipline dealing with what is good and bad, and with moral duty and obligation; a set of moral principles; a theory or system of moral values” (n.d.-a). As such, ethics-related decisions occur within specific contexts that employ differing rules and norms. Cameron and Price (2009) suggest that researcher conduct is guided by a number of different obligations:

• Legal obligations apply to the country or countries in which researchers conduct studies, collect data, and store data. These activities don’t always occur within the same country. Consider, for example, the impact of the GDPR (General Data Protection Regulations) on using employee data from a European subsidiary of an American company.
• Professional obligations are established by professional associations (e.g., the Academy of Management or the American Psychological Association) to guide member conduct. If they violate these rules of conduct, researchers can be sanctioned for disgracing the professional association or discipline.
• Cultural obligations refer to informal rules that set appropriate behavior. For example, if a researcher wants to interview the chief executive of a large company, in some societies, particularly those with low power distance (Hofstede, 2003), it would be perfectly acceptable for the researcher to simply contact them directly via LinkedIn, Twitter, or some similar platform. However, in countries with high power distance (Hofstede, 2003), this would be frowned upon and considered very disrespectful. 
• Personal obligations refer to the beliefs, values, and subsequent behavioral choices that individuals make of their own free will. For example, to what extent does someone believe that it is acceptable to cause minor harm to one person in order to prevent major harm to another? What level of harm is acceptable in this case? Does it depend on who the people are? Their ages? Their current quality of life?

Any researcher is doing their research within the context of all these obligations. Cameron and Price (2009, p. 121) employ a useful diagram to illustrate this (Figure 6.1).