Ethical Approval for Research

A Brief Student Guide to Research Ethics

The University policy for Research Ethics Approval applies to all University staff and registered students who are conducting, or planning to conduct, research involving human participants, personal data, and human tissue, as well as any staff or students you are responsible for and are conducting research on University premises.

Research that is potentially high risk will involve ‘particularly vulnerable participants’ - whether directly, or in terms of personal data about them - and/or address ‘highly sensitive topics’ (see below for Export Control legislation).

Conversely, while low risk research may involve neither ‘particularly vulnerable participants’ nor ‘highly sensitive topics’, if it involves human participants, personal data, or human tissue it must be assessed.

The third criterion that should be used to assess risk is the nature of the research itself, particularly with respect to the safety and well-being of participants (including researchers); for example, any research that involves active intervention in the lives of research participants is likely to be more risky than a project that does not, and should be assessed accordingly.

The Department can only accept requests relevant to the "University Procedure", or in other words, research which:

• falls under the broad definition of 'an investigation to gain knowledge or understanding';

• is led by the University of Sheffield;

• does not involve the National Health Service; and

• is undertaken in the United Kingdom.

All approval requests must be submitted through the online ethics review system, which is open for both staff and student applications.

Instructions on how to use the system can be found below

Even if a project is low risk your application must contain sufficient information to stand up to external scrutiny - ethics reviews are not dependent on the knowledge held by individuals in the department.

Describe in detail WHAT, HOW, and WHEN you will do it.

Department Ethical Review Contacts

Leading reviewer: Dr Jen Rowson - j.rowson@sheffield.ac.uk

Administrator: Sarah Black - sarah.black@sheffield.ac.uk

Export Control Legislation

Export control legislation exists to ensure that know-how, technology, goods or information do not fall into the wrong hands to be used for example, in extreme cases, Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD). Exports can be physical or electronic.

It is the University’s responsibility to make researchers aware and to provide support to them to be able to comply. It is the responsibility of individual researchers to comply and failure to comply with this legislation is a criminal offence.

Here are some questions to ask yourself:

1. Are you working on a military research project?

2. Do you think that your project outputs could be useful for military purposes (even if that isn’t your intention)

3. Are you sending or taking physical goods overseas?

4. Are you traveling overseas with project information on a laptop or USB?

5. Do you share project information such as plans or specifications by email, text or by uploading information to a server?

6. Are you talking to partners overseas about your work either by telephone, Skype or FaceTime?

Please read the attached crib sheet and file it away.