Northeast Ethics Education
Partnership (NEEP)
Training Resources
To access NEEP’s training materials, please visit
http://brown.edu/research/research-ethics/teachingmaterials-presentations/teaching-materialspresentations
to download a materials request form and then email a
completed form to NEEPethics@yahoo.com.
Research Ethics, Culture and Community-based Research
Training for Graduate Students and Faculty
(also for CPBR Community Research Review and IRB Boards)
NEEP is funded through a grant from the National Science Foundation
Ethics Education in Science and Engineering (EESE)
Research Ethics Focus:
Group Protections
• Basic human subject protections are mainly
regulated for individual human subjects.
• NBAC and other international guidelines do make
recommendations for cultural protections and
protections for communities.
• In environmental health, place-based communities
and cultural groups will require special
considerations in research ethics.
Community Protections/Beneficence in
Environmental Health
• Ethical concerns:
- Fair allocation of benefits for the community as well as
generalized beneficence,
- Community or cultural exploitation, forms of stigmatization
- Inappropriate or harmful treatment, including culturallyinappropriate research
- Forms of cultural ignorance, arrogance, ethnocentrism
- Need for community consultation or partnership models
- Need for intercultural methods, approaches and linguistic
diversity
• Need for research approaches with more local benefits and
long-term commitment to prolonged or chronic
environmental health problems.
• Need for data management and dissemination protocols with
sensitive community or cultural data.
• Realize that many disadvantaged communities or cultural
groups are vulnerable groups in research requiring more
protections.
(See training slide on Research Ethics Protections for Placebased Communities and Cultural Groups” for expanded
discussion)
NEEP TRAINING GOALS
• The Northeast Ethics Education Partnership has organized
over thirty training slide shows to promote graduate student
and faculty training with individual and group protections for
place-based communities and cultural groups.
• The following training slides are incorporated into 4- 6
modules in short course or blended on-line training, using
applied ethics articles and case studies from the appropriate
fields of study.
• New shows are always underway.
Bioethical Principles for Research Ethics: The
Protection of Individual Human Subjects
These slides provide an overview of the concepts of the common
morality, the nature of rights, and moral virtues. The four principles
related to protecting human subjects in research -- beneficence,
non maleficence, respect for autonomy, and justice-- are described
and examples are provided.
The history of human subjects protections is also reviewed,
including the Nuremberg Code, the Declaration of Helsinki, the
need for informed consent and the creation of Institutional Review
Boards, and the Belmont Report (44 slides).
Informed Consent with Cultural Considerations
• The basic definitions and elements of informed
consent are reviewed however with an emphasis on
how informed consent and respect for autonomy
became problematic with those who respect
group/family/tribal or community-based decisions.
• Various articles provide guidance with these
challenges along with methods for improving
language/communication barriers to consent
(44 slides).
Institutional Review Board (IRB) and
Human Subjects Protections
Summarizes key aspects of Institutional Review Board
requirements for students/researchers. The Belmont Report is
the guiding document on ethical research and human subjects
protections, including the concepts of beneficence, respect
for persons(informed consent) and justice.
Next, we discuss the definition of “research” according to the
IRB, the process of IRB review, and considerations related to
student research (29 slides).
Cultural Competence and Community Studies:
Concepts and Practices for Cultural Competence
Provides a review of cultural competence theory; of defining
cultural competence, skills that relate to being a cultural
competent researcher, considerations to take when working
with diverse communities, issues with intercultural language
and communication, and the concepts of humility and critical
consciousness (29 slides).
Community-Based Research &
Environmental Justice Interventions:
CBPR Best Practices & Intercultural Designs
Part one of this presentation covers: what is communitybased research? Why is it valuable? What are the ethical
benefits? The CBPR process and related benefits of
partnerships and collaboration are examined, as well as the
importance of community review boards (Slides 1-33).
The second part provides best CBPR practices with case
studies in environmental justice/health communities
(Slides 34-77).
IRB Challenges in Community-Based Participatory Research
on Humans Exposure to Environmental Toxicants
Adequately protecting human subjects in research goes
deeper and broader than the formal IRB processes for
protection. These slides discuss the variety of ethical issues
related to human subjects research, including informed
consent, community right-to-know and report-back of study
results to research participants, and the use of community
advisory boards.
Several case studies are examined, specifically focusing on
biomonitoring and household exposure studies and
environmental justice issues. The role of IRBs, including
related challenges, is also discussed (Slides 51).
Discourse: Forms and Uses
Introduces the topic of discourse: a word used to describe
communication including the use of spoken, written, signed
language, visual and oral media. Discourse is usually linked to
issues of defining power and political conditions in nationstates; particularly post modern or postcolonial claims of
oppressed groups.
The idea of overcoming power imbalances in discourse
practices within community-based research is explored, as
well as alternative discourse needs and forms (13 slides).
“Power and Privilege Issues with Culturally-Diverse
Communities in Research: New Challenges of Partnership
and Collaborative Research”
Explores the importance of developing truly participatory
research designs and having a high level of cultural knowledge
and sensitivity. This is in contrast to bringing in preconceived
notions, one-sided planning, or ascribing to outside expert
solutions that do not fit or benefit the community (9 slides).
Privacy and Confidentiality: Issues in Research
Emphasizes the importance of maintaining confidentiality in
research and protecting research participants’ privacy and
information. Privacy issues, both in the public health field and
in qualitative research, are explored, as well as the various
ways that confidentiality may be breached.
A review of the risks to third parties’ privacy is also
included(35 slides).
Research Ethics Protections for Place-Based
Communities and Cultural Groups
Provides information on both international guidelines and
applied ethics articles for enhancing or requiring group
protections in research, for place-based communities and
cultural groups - Part One (25 Slides).
A review of case studies from community-based participatory
research (CBPR) with innovative research designs/methods
and dissemination practices to enhance intercultural
engagement and cultural sensitivity are also provided
Part Two ( 50 slides).
Working with the Community as Unit of Identity
Reviews the definition and characteristics of what makes a
community, how the formation of community advisory boards
are instrumental to truly engaging community and who
community representatives may be in various contexts. It also
discusses the idea of community capacity, and how to both
build and evaluate it (15 slides).
Research Integrity:
Problems of Scientific Misconduct
Explores the concepts of scientific misconduct which can
jeopardize the integrity of research, including conflict of
interest, plagiarism, results suppression, falsification/
fabrication, avoiding controversial research, unethical
behavior, research harassment, and questionable research
practices. Environmental health case studies are presented.
The ideas of co-authorship, research misconduct among
graduate students, and consequences of misconduct are also
explored (51 slides).
Ethical Theories Presentations
Communitarian Ethics
Introduces communitarian ethics, forms of community-based
moral decision-making. We review the tensions between
(liberal) individualism and communitarianism; including the
criticisms of liberalism, a discussion of communitarian ethics
and claims, and the critiques of communitarianism.
Communitarianism recognizes the need to agree on group
values and consensus decision-making as part of the effort to
maintain social order while ensuring that these group forces
do not suppress all autonomous expressions (17 slides).
Deontology and Distributive Justice
Deontology is concerned with choices that are morally
required, forbidden, or permitted. These slides review the
various concepts that fall under deotonological ethical theory,
such as obedience to duty, opposing utilitarianism, and the
good vs. the right. Kantian ethics are also explored, as well as
J. Rawl’s Theory of Justice (32 slides).
Care Ethics (The Ethics of Care)
The ethics of care are reviewed, reflecting on the work of
Carol Gilligan’s “A Different Voice” from feminist ethics. The
relationship between ethics of care and normative ethics is
explored: the morality based on universal and common
principals of morality vs. relational ethics; such as
understanding, empathy, emotion, co-feeling, and moral
autonomy (24 slides).
Liberal Individualism: Ethical Philosophies of John
Locke, JS Mill, Immanuel Kant, and Civil Rights
Covers concepts such as classical liberalism; John Locke’s
ideology on personal property rights; JS Mill’s individual
liberty; and Kant’s notions of autonomy, free will, good will,
moral reason, moral duty, and the categorical vs. hypothetical
imperative. Bioethical principles are mostly based on liberalindividualism, with virtue ethics and some distributive justice.
In the last section, the achievement of the African-Americans
equal rights amendment is included (48 slides).
Postmodern Ethics: Approaches to
New Moral Forms and Practices
Introduces postmodern ethics and their relevance to current
research with theories that discuss emergent ethics, working
with cultural difference and allowing for a multiplicity of
voices and forms in a research practice. Levinas’s “Ethics of
the Other” offers a new moral approach to research with
diverse groups (14 slides).
Utilitarianism and Consequentialism
Covers the basics of classical utilitarianism, as well as related
concepts and variations such as Bentham and Mill’s
utilitarianism. Utility as pleasure and pain, justice, rationalism,
public utility, and utility as a social end are discussed.
The second half of the presentation explores
consequentialism and the various types of consequential
approaches, including welfare, indirect, direct, global, motive,
and scalar consequentialism (51 slides).
Virtue Ethics: Aristotle, Aquinas,
Hildegard of Bingen, MacIntyre
Provides an overview of virtue ethics from the lens of Aristotle
and other philosophers listed in the title of this presentation.
The ideas of excellence, right reason, intellectual and moral
virtues, virtues as allegory, discernment, compassion, and
self-awareness are discussed. MacIntyre’s virtues as social
goods of the community are discussed (27 slides).
Other Training Slides Available
• Informed Consent Theory
• Community Partnership Ethics: Richmond Case Study
• Human Rights Histories of African Americans,
Hispanic Americans, Native Americans
• Environmental Justice
• Environmental Ethics
• Participatory Research
• Traditional Ecological Knowledge
• Intellectual Property Rights
Course Syllabi and Materials
• Course Syllabi - Also for review are short courses and
long semester courses on research ethics, culture
and community-based research.
• Course Readers or Blackboard/MyCourse On-line or
Blended Training can be developed with specific
modules and case studies and applied ethics articles
and regulatory guidance.
• Student Incentives: Research Ethics Certificate,
stipends, 1-3 academic credits.
Teaching Methods with Grad Students
• Conversational powerpoint lectures, case analysis
with students in small groups or as a class,
community/other speakers, youtube/film
presentations.
• Student presentations from research
• Student research with assigned short essays and final
paper, doing mock IRB application or
ethical/cultural/CBPR analyses of cases.
Outreach to Faculty for
Teaching Resources
• One on one faculty meetings: co-create or follow
advice for specific slide show designs, may require
cases and articles related to specific disciplines or
locations. Assist faculty in organizing ethical
dilemmas in their disciplines and identifying training
needs to deal with these dilemmas.
• In class presentations: contact teaching faculty to
insert one or more presentations in their regular
course offerings.
Faculty Outreach
• Faculty Teaching Data-base: provide access to teaching
slides and articles/cases for each faculty’s use in the
classroom; Blackboard Page.
• Series of Luncheon Workshops: recruiting multiple
speakers covering research ethics, culture and
community-based topics.
• Listservs of Faculty:
Advertise training resources to faculty through
emails.
Contact:
Dianne Quigley, PhD
Adjunct Assistant Professor
NEEP Principal Investigator
Center for Environmental Studies
Brown University
PO Box 1943, 135 Angell St.
Providence, RI 02912
Dianne_Quigley_1@brown.edu
NEEPethics@yahoo.com
http://brown.edu/research/research-ethics/neep