Ethics

Project ethics is an important topic for everyone. Whether you are doing a user study or theoretical proofs, part of the process is being aware of the potential ethical concerns with each type of project. Projects will vary in the level of ethical approval that is required, but understanding this is a required ILO.

Ethics Statement

All projects will need an ethics statement at the beginning of the dissertation, and all projects will fall into one of three categories:

Projects that do not require ethical approval because they do not collect or process any relevant data.
Projects that can be covered by the Unit Blanket Ethics approval because they are judged to be low ethical risk.
Projects that require full ethical review and approval by a University Research Ethics Committee (UREC).

We will provide ethical training with a mandatory test to ensure that you’ve understood what is permitted under each of the above categories. The test allows multiple attempts and is released in TB1 alongside the training.

If in doubt, ASK YOUR SUPERVISOR about whether your project requires ethical approval.

No Ethics

A project requiring no ethics will not:

conduct user studies
ask someone who’s not your supervisor to provide feedback that will be used in the project
take any photos/recordings of people (including yourself)
collect data from online resources
process anonymised data so that it is de-anonymised.

You can use online datasets for a projects with no ethics, as long as the data has been released as part of a dataset for research and the project isn’t changing the data in a way that is unethical and/or goes against the original release. If you are collecting a dataset from an online source then you will need to complete a full ethics application

Blanket Ethics

Blanket Ethics is an ethics approval that we have obtained from a UREC on behalf of the unit. It covers many low concern aspects of projects that require ethical approval. We’ve just managed to do this already for you.

Blanket Ethics covers projects that:

conduct a survey or interviews, e.g. for feedback, where the participant information remains anonymous.
does not collect data from vulnerable populations (for example children, the elderly).
does not collect sensitive data, e.g. about mental health conditions, or protected characteristics, e.g. sexuality, race etc.
collects anonymised data.
collects informed consent from participants before they take part in the study.
takes photography/recordings where the participant is anonymous (e.g. you can see their hands but not their face, or hear their voice but not know their name).
uses photographs/recordings of yourself, even if you can be identified.
puts participants under NO physical or mental risk of harm.

When writing your dissertation you will need to include the following statement in the front matter: “This project is covered by the blanket ethics application 6683 as determined by my supervisor SUPERVISOR_NAME”.

Full Ethical Review

All projects that contain one or more of the following or are similarly sensitive, require full ethical review:

Collecting data from a vulnerable population (e.g. children)
Collecting sensitive data and/or data about protected characteristics.
Collecting non-anonymised data.
Scraping data from an online source to create a new dataset.
Deceives participants.
Danger of physical and/or mental harm
Participants aren’t able to give informed consent.

If you are in any doubt about whether you need full ethical approval you should talk to your supervisor BEFORE starting any data collection or user studies. Projects that need a full ethical approval (e.g. scam baiting projects, work with children etc) can still take place, but you must talk to your supervisor as soon as possible, and get the ethics application submitted as one of the very first project tasks, as you can’t start the studies without the ethical agreement.

There is no guarantee that ethics will be granted for a project. You will need to have strong reasons for why your project contains one of the above aspects. For example, collecting non-anonymised data only because anonymisation is too much effort will be rejected.

Your supervisor will submit your application on your behalf and so you should discuss your application with your supervisor IN DETAIL before anything is submitted.

Full ethics applications can take considerable time to get approval and so it is essential that you discuss the issue with your supervisor as soon as possible;e. You should consider whether you can modify your project so that it aligns with the blanket ethics approval, hence avoid a full application.

Projects covered by other exisiting Ethics applications

Some projects will be covered by applications your Supervisor has put in or is a part of. If this is the case, you don’t need to make a separate application - just get the Ethics application number for the project and add this statement to the frontmatter Ethics declaration:

“This project is covered by the ethics application [NUMBER] as determined by my supervisor [SUPERVISOR_NAME]”.

Performing a User Study

DO NOT start a User Study without talking to your supervisor about it!

If you are performing a user study, then you must make sure your participants are given and information sheet about the project and sign a consent form. Talk to your supervisor about what these should contain. You must include copies of the consent form and participant information sheet in the appendix of your dissertation along with the ethics statement.

If you are creating an online form to collect user study data, this MUST be using Microsoft Forms. Google forms or similar is not allowed.

The Ethics Lecture and Quiz

In order to pass the unit, you must get 100% on the Ethics Quiz, in TB2. Before you take the quiz, you should watch the Ethics lecture which will give you the information you need.

The Ethics Quiz will be on your Unit Blackboard - go to Assessment, Submission & Feedback and scroll down. You can take the quiz as many times as you like, and you’ll get immediate feedback if you get an answer wrong, so everyone is capable of getting 100%.