Abstract
Undergraduate research as a high-impact practice demonstrates many positive benefits for students, but little research has delved into the impact of ethical training for research, in particular submitting Institutional Review Board (IRB) protocols to determine if the study meets ethical standards for the treatment of human subjects. This study explored if students in two experimental and one nonexperimental research methods class benefited from increased knowledge of research ethics and how to apply them in daily-life situations if they participated in various aspects of IRB protocol procedures either as part of a class-based research project or by completing an IRB protocol activity for developing a hypothetical program to help families. Some students in all three classes had previously engaged in a 4-hr online extended training [the Collaborative Institutional Training Initiative (CITI) Program] in research ethics focused on the Belmont Report principles of beneficence, respect, and justice, but not in IRB protocols. Students were given a pre- and posttest to assess knowledge in both research and daily-life settings for applying the Belmont Report research ethics principles. Results indicate students gained greater knowledge of research ethics when they completed IRB protocol training during a class-based undergraduate research or program-design project, even if they had already completed some extended case-based training in the CITI Program. Results are discussed in terms of the value of using modified IRB protocol approaches as a high-impact practice to teach ethics in research and daily life to students.
Highlights
High-impact practices (HIPs) generally refer to a group of 11 practices designed to increase student engagement in the learning process and involvement with faculty by promoting active, hands-on activities in a collaborative and mentored environment that lead to deep and extended dives into the material and skills to be learned (Kuh, 2008; Kuh, O’Donnell, & Schneider, 2017)
The first hypothesis was that traditional methods of instruction would be related to greater understanding of the Belmont Report research ethics principles (BREPs), but especially when that instruction was in greater depth congruent with the training necessary for submission of Institutional Review Board (IRB) protocols through Collaborative Institutional Training Initiative (CITI) training
The data demonstrate that a modified IRB protocol experience within a course-based undergraduate research experiences (CUREs) is associated with increased understanding of the three BREPs and how to apply them to everyday-life experiences
Summary
High-impact practices (HIPs) generally refer to a group of 11 practices designed to increase student engagement in the learning process and involvement with faculty by promoting active, hands-on activities in a collaborative and mentored environment that lead to deep and extended dives into the material and skills to be learned (Kuh, 2008; Kuh, O’Donnell, & Schneider, 2017). IRB protocols require researchers to address each of the three principles from the Belmont Report on research ethics with humans by answering a series of questions to determine if research participants are being treated ethically These include beneficence, which encourages researchers to consider how to maximize benefits while minimizing the harm of research participation; respect, which emphasizes the need to consider research participants as autonomous in the decision-making process and has led to guidelines for obtaining informed consent and avoiding coercion of participants; and justice, which holds researchers to fairness and lack of bias, focusing on protecting subjects from exploitation. Undergraduate students have rarely been involved in this early stage of research development and have not benefited from the critical analysis and hands-on experience of preparing such protocols
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