Research Ethics and Integrity For Postgraduate Students and Early Career Researchers

Universities, research funding bodies, publishers and research communities all assume that research ethics and research integrity will be at the centre of researcher development programmes, and that acquisition of a higher degree and participation in research programmes will reflect high standards of ethical conduct and integrity in research design, development and delivery. Yet the pressures of deadlines and the focus on discipline and field and the thesis being undertaken can mean that ethics and integrity agendas are regarded as ‘hurdles’ or ‘impositions’ to be overcome rather than central to best practice in research and critical qualities for the researcher. The consequences of this, in researchers lack of knowledge about ethical research, potential academic malpractice or in poor research practice that produces ethical errors, are significant. At the same time, a knowledge of research ethics and incorporation of research ethics into practice can augment and enrich thinking your research development, practice and outputs. 

This session targets postgraduate students and early career researchers, though more experienced researchers/principal investigators who feel they need to refresh their research ethics knowledge will also benefit. It will assume a very basic understanding of research ethics and so provide a comprehensive introduction as well as providing a systematic outline of issues of research ethics, integrity and governance, the contexts and issues they raise for researchers and how to develop a deliberative approach to research questions that contributes to best research practice. In order to orient the discussion to the concerns of participants, to be of optimal use to them, each participant who registers will be asked to:

• identify their discipline or field and their thesis or current research project(s) and,

• Any ethical issues they are currently addressing or have concerns about.

These details should be submitted to hrbookings@ul.ie by Thursday 25th May at 12.00pm to be considered in the final programme for the day.

Programme