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Abstract
The National Science Foundation’s (NSF) Second Merit Criterion, or Broader Impacts Criterion (BIC), was introduced in 1997 as the result of an earlier Congressional movement to enhance the accountability and responsibility as well as the effectiveness of federally funded projects. We demonstrate that a robust understanding and appreciation of NSF BIC argues for a broader conception of research ethics in the sciences than is currently offered in Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR) training. This essay advocates augmenting RCR education with training regarding broader impacts. We demonstrate that enhancing research ethics training in this way provides a more comprehensive understanding of the ethics relevant to scientific research and prepares scientists to think not only in terms of responsibly conducted science, but also of the role of science in responding to identified social needs and in adhering to principles of social justice. As universities respond to the mandate from America COMPETES to “provide training and oversight in the responsible and ethical conduct of research”, we urge institutions to embrace a more adequate conception of research ethics, what we call the Ethical Dimensions of Scientific Research, that addresses the full range of ethical issues relevant to scientific inquiry, including ethical issues related to the broader impacts of scientific research and practice.
Notes
[1] The Second Merit Criterion emphasized components of the original Criterion Three: Utility and Relevance of Research, and Criterion Four: Effect on Infrastructure of Science and Engineering; with two new concerns—namely, broadening the participation of under‐represented groups, and promoting teaching, training, and learning.
[2] Status Update on NSF Implementation of Section 7009 of the America COMPETES Act (ACA): Responsible Conduct of Research Advisory Committee for Business and Operations Spring Meeting, 29–30 May 2008.
[3] We would like to acknowledge the generous support of US NSF for providing funding for this research through Ethics in Engineering and Science Education Grant #0529766.
[4] This constellation/pool of specialties is not present in most institutions and has thus provided a novel context for this research to take place.
[5] Improvement in this case is described in two papers reporting on the research findings from the study, which included the development, piloting, and running of instruments (a total of 97 students completed the pre‐module assessments and 33 completed both the pre‐module and post‐module assessments) that assessed for improvements in students’ performance on a knowledge‐based RCR instrument (25 questions scored as either correct or wrong) and an instrument assessing attitudes towards research ethics (10 questions with a scale of one to five as to whether the situation was unethical or ethical alongside qualitative written answers explaining their reasoning).
[6] Seven of the 10 modules are published and the modules and instructor manuals are available from http://rockethics.psu.edu/education/environment/nsf.shtml; INTERNET. Two of the modules are still in development and one module was excluded after peer review
[7] The terms procedural, extrinsic, and intrinsic are being used here in a manner that is specific to the EDSR model. Procedural ethics in this case refers to proper conduct of research in a laboratory and is not intended to link to a broader conception of procedural justice.
[8] For a full discussion of intrinsic ethics see the forthcoming paper Schienke et al. “Intrinsic ethics: An approach to teaching ethics to graduate students in the environmental sciences—the case of discounting in climate change policy”.
[9] We received verbal feedback from 11 participants to the piloting of the module at a workshop. We conducted in‐depth debriefing interviews with three of the research scientists involved. However, we can make no claim as to the representativeness of our sample of pilot participants and interviewees. These are simply responses collected across the sample.
[10] Again, while BIC issues emerged mainly from climate research in this case, which has many obvious linkages to public policy and the well‐being of many, they exemplify issues relevant to many forms of scientific research used in decision‐making.
[11] Although in introducing our model of the ethical dimensions of scientific research we separated intrinsic ethics and extrinsic ethics to clarify and illustrate these concepts, we recognize that in some instances intrinsic and extrinsic ethical issues overlap. Hence the use of a Venn diagram. Topics such as the responsible use of research can involve all three aspects of the ethical dimensions of scientific research.