Internal Review Board

To my knowledge school teachers in Malaysia are able to carry out action research without having going through any review board. In schools, teacher can carry out their action research studies without problems. They just have to inform the heads of department (Panel Heads) and carry out their action research. The findings from action research are then translated into action research reports. These action reports when completed are sent to the District Education Department. There are also no internal review boards at district and state levels. This is actually something new to me.

But after reading the Belmont Report (http://ohsr.od.nih.gov/guidelines/belmont.html) I realized the importance of having internal review board particularly in protecting and safeguarding the interests and welfare of research participants in research.
Here are some things that I picked up from the Belmont Report:
- In 1979, the Belmont Report: Ethical Principles and Guidelines for the Protection of Human Subjects of Research was published in the United States.
- It led to mandate for review of research involving human research participants.
Research must adhere to these basic ethical principles:
i) Respect for persons
- demands that participants enter into a research program voluntarily and and were informed adequately of the research goals.
ii)Beneficence
- must protect participants’ well-being and not harm the participants
- obligated to maximize possible benefits and minimize possible harms
iii)Justice (benefits and risks of research be distributed fairly)
- concerning who ought to receive the benefits of research and who are the ones who bear the its burdens
- In 19th and early 20th centuries the burdens of serving as research subjects fell largely upon poor ward patients, while the benefits of improved medical care flowed primarily to private patients.
- Other injustices are getting participants from vulnerable populations such as
prisoners, racial minorities, welfare patients and etc. due to research convenience and their easy availability due to their compromised position rather than for reasons directly related to the problem being studied.
- According to Purdue University Committee on the use of Human Research Subjects, participantsshould not be selected due to class, socioeconomic status, or race unless justified by the research objectives. (http://www.irb.purdue.edu/belmont.shtml)