How might unethical research practices negatively impact the well-being of research participants?
So this time it’s the research participants that we’re talking about. Number one, loss of autonomy, meaning when you lost autonomy, you lost your right to refuse to participate doon sa pinaka research. When you lost autonomy, you know the Tuskegee report that has been done, yung black people were subjected to a certain scientific research, whereby they were deceited. Hindi sila ininform. Informed consent is violated to human participants.There is a legal consequence of that.
Another is psychological harm to the participants, and that was proven, that’s why in the legal battle in the Tuskegee, a president of the United States said, I’m not really sure if it’s Bill Clinton who apologizes to those human participants who have been subjected to the deceit of the real processes of the trial that has been done to them.
Another is stigmatization and discrimination. Another is physical harm. Katulad nga doon sa Tuskegee, I’m not really sure if it’s syphilis. Sinubject sila doon sa syphilis virus, tapos hindi naman nila alam na yun pala yung gagawin sa kanila.
Another is there is an erosion of trust to the researcher by the human participants. Informed decision-making is impaired. Of course, there is a deceit, there is no informed consent that has been given, so impaired yung decision-making process nung participants, whether or not he will or he will not participate. That’s why it’s a domino effect of the seven basic ethical principles.
Another is loss of privacy. Kasi nga walang informed consent. Impact on vulnerable population, this is very important. There is a legal issue kapag ka naviolate ito.
And then there is a public mistrust in research. In the scientific community, would you believe on the data that will be released or the results of the data if there is deceit already that has been done? That’s why we keep on telling the researchers, or say for example proponent, sometimes they would complain. Okay, cause of delay ang research ethical clearance. Hindi, kasi nga we are trying to protect human participants, which basically is the real essence of research ethics, as well as we follow through an ethically principled research. So that our research integrity is protected. Yung integrity ng research is high. Talagang pinaniniwalaan yung results mo and as well as yung recommendation mo based on the results that you got.
