Professional Norms and Personal Responsibility in Research Ethics

Researchers have various responsibilities. In addition to avoiding inappropriate research conduct (such as fabrication, falsification, and plagiarism) and implementing the responsible conduct of research (RCR), they must also be fully responsible for the proper protection of their research subjects (including human individuals and groups, as well as experimental animals) throughout all stages of the research from beginning to end.

On the basis of this core principle, many scientific research agencies, associations and journals of professional fields have established specific ethical norms. This helps to ensure that researchers in the relevant field have access to the basic behavioral requirements and standards they must follow when conducting research. The implementation of these norms depends on professional researchers’ consistent practice of self-discipline in fully complying with relevant ethical research attitudes and behaviors, while avoiding any risk of involving inappropriate research conduct.

The ethical norms for conducting research come from four main sources: professional norms, government regulations, institutional policies, and personal responsibilities (台灣聯合大學系統信義榮譽講座編輯小組譯，2009；Steneck, 2007).

In this module, the specific connotations of professional norms and personal responsibilities will be explained. Well-known ethical and professional norms in Taiwan and overseas, as well as the types of ethics that must be followed when conducting research and researchers’ personal responsibilities, will also be elaborated for researchers’ reference.

Unit Objectives

The completion of this unit is expected to allow researchers to achieve the following goals:

1. Understand the purpose and necessity of professional and ethical norms.
2. Understand the personal responsibilities that researchers must undertake during the research process.