TY - JOUR
T1 - Assessing the climate for research ethics in labs
T2 - Development and validation of a brief measure
AU - Solomon, Erin D.
AU - English, Tammy
AU - Wroblewski, Matthew
AU - DuBois, James M.
AU - Antes, Alison L.
N1 - Funding Information:
This research was supported by the Office of Research Integrity under Grant ORI2018000286 and the National Human Genome Research Institute under Grant K01HG008990. We thank Mary Quandt and Emily Schenk for their assistance with recruitment.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
PY - 2022
Y1 - 2022
N2 - The environment researchers work in influences their ethical decisions and behavior. A “climate” for research ethics in a research lab exists when members of the lab perceive that the group values and is committed to principles of research ethics. In this study, we aimed to develop a short, reliable and valid measure assessing perceptions of climate for research ethics at the lab level. The resulting measure, Lab Climate for Research Ethics, was developed using standard scale development guidelines. In a large sample of postdoctoral researchers (N = 570), we found preliminary evidence that the new measure has adequate internal consistency reliability. It was also correlated with an existing measure of climate for research ethics and was not correlated with social desirability, demonstrating evidence of construct validity. The new measure can be used in a variety of contexts, including research administrators seeking information about climate within labs across an institution and researchers who study lab environments.
AB - The environment researchers work in influences their ethical decisions and behavior. A “climate” for research ethics in a research lab exists when members of the lab perceive that the group values and is committed to principles of research ethics. In this study, we aimed to develop a short, reliable and valid measure assessing perceptions of climate for research ethics at the lab level. The resulting measure, Lab Climate for Research Ethics, was developed using standard scale development guidelines. In a large sample of postdoctoral researchers (N = 570), we found preliminary evidence that the new measure has adequate internal consistency reliability. It was also correlated with an existing measure of climate for research ethics and was not correlated with social desirability, demonstrating evidence of construct validity. The new measure can be used in a variety of contexts, including research administrators seeking information about climate within labs across an institution and researchers who study lab environments.
KW - Research integrity
KW - climate
KW - measurement
KW - research environment
KW - research ethics
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85100557195&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1080/08989621.2021.1881891
DO - 10.1080/08989621.2021.1881891
M3 - Article
C2 - 33517782
AN - SCOPUS:85100557195
VL - 29
SP - 2
EP - 17
JO - Accountability in Research
JF - Accountability in Research
SN - 0898-9621
IS - 1
ER -