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Protecting privacy in social sciences and humanities research: an international perspective

Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada announce study 'Protecting privacy in social sciences and humanities research: an international perspective.'

This study examines research ethics codes in North America, the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand to see what sort of guidance they give to researchers about how to present guarantees of confidentiality to research subjects in light of various laws relating to confidentiality, privacy and evidentiary privilege. Also, it examines instances where lawful challenges to research confidentiality have actually occurred.

The study examines three potential lawful challenges to research confidentiality:

  1. The threat of court-ordered disclosure of confidential research information (for a description of the US experience see Lowman and Palys (pdf) [SFU website]).
  2. A threat to research confidentiality may arise in tort law when, for example, a researcher receives, in confidence, information that a third party is in imminent danger of serious physical injury or death.
  3. Mandatory reporting laws mean that, depending on the jurisdiction, a researcher may be obliged to report certain offences or incidents, such as child abuse or infectious diseases, should they come to light in research.

Although the team is currently searching on-line legal databases for cases involving researchers, they believe that they may miss certain incidents, particularly those that did not end up in court. Consequently, they seek any instances in the UK of the following:

  1. A researcher receiving a subpoena seeking access to confidential research information.
  2. A civil action against a researcher for failing to prevent an imminent harm on the basis of information provided by a research participant.
  3. A researcher reporting an incident of child abuse, infectious disease or some other activity, because of a legal obligation to do so.

They plan to have their report finished by July 1st, 2006 – please let them know if you would like to receive a copy at that time.

Contact email for the study is lowman@sfu.ca

For correspondence: Prof. John Lowman, School of Criminology, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C. V5A 1S6