Business Research Ethics

Business Research Ethics
Ethical decision making is important for researchers. Codes, policies, and principals are very important and useful, like any set of rules; however, they do not cover every situation. They often conflict, and they require considerable interpretation. It is therefore important for researchers to learn how to interpret, assess, and apply various research rules and how to make decisions and to act in various situations. There are many situations where research is not ethical. These actions would be regarded as unethical and some might even be illegal. These actions may also violate professional ethics codes or institutional policies.
According to the article, “Accounts Offered for Unethical Research Practices: Effects on the Evaluations of Acts and Actors,” describes two scenarios of two psychologists fabricating data and using plagiarism in their research. One Psychologist, who was a professor at a large university, was accused of fabricating some of the data in a large, longitudinal research project. Evidence resulted in an investigation. It was determined that subjects reported to have begun their participation with this psychologist in 1975, really did not begin their participation until 1977. However, the participants did report that they were contacted to participate in 1975. Due to the fabrication of data, job security and salaries of the Psychology Department were in jeopardy. The Psychologist admitted to making up some data due to missing data from his subjects. The second psychologist was also a professor at a large university, who was accused of plagiarizing one of his published research articles by another research group. They had identified several paragraphs in the Psychologist’s paper that were identical to paragraphs in a paper they published 10 years previously in a European Journal. The group had