Bernd Carsten Stahl & Damian Eke

1. Ethical Reviews of Information and Communications Technology Research Projects across UK Computing Departments: The State of the Art Bernd Carsten Stahl & Damian Eke

2. Presentation Outline • Introduction • Definitions • What is ICT? • What is Ethics Reviews? • Importance of Ethics Review in ICT Research • Research Aim • The Survey • Findings • Conclusions: • Limitations • Future Research

3. Introduction Research in ICT:- • Becoming broad and varied owing to the increasing convergence of technologies • Exacerbates old ethical questions of privacy, intellectual property and identity • Increasingly involve human being (e.g. ICT implants) Therefore • There is a need for decisions to be taken • Ethical problems solved and anticipated • Legislations need to be adopted and • And an ethical framework for research review formulated and implemented.

4. Definitions ICT-Information and Communications Technology • It means the production and usage of technology artefact that can store, retrieve, manipulate, transmit or receive information electronically in a digital form. (e.g personal computers, network hardware and software, satellite systems digital television, radio, robots etc Ethics Review • is an integral part of research ethics that promotes the adherence to ethical norms in research so as to maintain the aims of research such as knowledge, truth, avoidance of error and harm.

5. Importance of Ethics review in ICT Research • Contributes to a more proactive research community. • Encourages good and ethical research and • Ensures the sustainability of ICT research.

6. Research Aim • Identify the current state of the art in ethical reviews of ICT projects in UK computing departments • Understand the ethical issues involved in ICT research • So as to develop such ethical framework that will provide a frame of reference for UK researchers in ICT.

7. The Survey • 345 respondents selected randomly from academic staff list (from University websites) • of 97 UK computing departments were contacted. • 30 participants responded.

8. Survey (contd)

9. Problems and challenges raised by ethical review policies in UK Universities • Generally accepted and well balanced, • A box-ticking exercise. • Lack of awareness of Ethical issues • Lack of a procedure to follow up the outcome of the research. • Time Constraint • Audit Issues • Volume of Work • Lack of seriousness towards the procedure • additional and insignificant hurdle to pass and an obstacle to research.

10. Findings

11. Findings (contd)

12. What can be changed about ethics review policies in UK Universities? • simplification of the procedure either by cutting down the number of forms to be completed or by substituting the forms with a statement regarding the ethical implications. • ethical review of all ICT research projects and not some specific projects, • the introduction of ethics training for Head of departments • improvement of publicity in ethics review issues, • introduction of an ethics review process that is interactive and not just a box-ticking exercise- that should be ongoing with the research and through to the outcome of the research and finally • raising awareness among project co-ordinators, supervisors and students.

13. Conclusion Limitations • self-selection bias Future Research • Reconciliation of the differences in the existing ethics review policies in computing departments in UK. • how can UK computing departments provide an academic environment that encourages ethical research by promoting integrity and best practices? • What are the benefits of regular ethics training for both staff and students- to raise both old and novel ethical issues in computing science?