IRB Ethics Guidebook
Time to Read: <4 Minutes I have had the pleasure to serve on an Institutional Review Board since 2016. The experience has benefitted me time and again as a researcher and as a friend to researchers. I have helped many of my peers with this daunting process and have realized two things: No matter which Univeristy in which state someone is attending, there are some common misconceptions about how IRB works. There is not much written specifically about the process to guide people through it. To fill that gap, I will periodically be posting about the IRB process. Note: My advice is general and will vary from school to school. I am not a lawyer or a compliance officer... just someone who wants to help. Background The whole point of an IRB is to protect humans used as guinea pigs for research. Prior to the passage of the National Research Act in 1974, a series of unregulated experiments resulted in the suffering and deaths of unwilling participants. The most famous include experiments by...