Responsible Conduct of Research
Program Description
Completion requirements
Award of a Certificate of Completion of the RCR program requires completion of all four sessions listed below in any sequence, normally over a two-year period. The schedule is repeated from year to year. Certificates of Completion are also awarded for completion of certain RCR pre-qualified research ethics courses at Boston University. These courses will be announced.
Program content
To meet the federal requirements as covered in the RCR program, the Office of Research Integrity of the Department of Health & Human Services recommends the following topics:
- Data acquisition, management, sharing and ownership
- Mentor/trainee responsibilities
- Publication practice and responsible authorship
- Peer review
- Collaborative Sciences
- Research misconduct
- Conflicts of interest and commitment
- Human Subjects
- Research involving animals
Trainees who work on human subjects or animal research projects must also receive separate specific training as required by the Charles River Campus and Boston University Medical Center Institutional Review Boards (human subjects research) and/or the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committees (animal research). Therefore, the topics of human subjects and animal research are touched upon for awareness purposes only.
The curriculum explores the complex considerations relevant to issues of research responsibility in today's research arena, which is highly dependent on government and industry funding and increasingly moving to complex collaborations. In analyzing and discussing realistic case scenarios, trainees will learn to:
- Identify and apply basic standards of integrity in research, and additional standards for certain types of research (protecting subjects of research, safety, etc.)
- Understand institutional roles and responsibilities of researchers and institutional leaders
- Understand the role of regulatory and compliance authorities, including government agencies and institutional compliance committees
- Understand the interests of research sponsors as expressed in contractual and grant requirements
- Practice communication skills in discussion and role-play negotiation
- Characterize levels of culpability, where research integrity has been compromised
- Assess the seriousness of potential deficiencies in research integrity
- Weigh the value of research integrity against other considerations such as waste or loss of scientific resources (collected data; intellectual property; present and future funding), individual career damage, damage to collegiality and morale in the research group
- Develop decision options and select options for actions that may result in the least harm.
Program Format
Each participatory session will be led by people knowledgeable in the field, including both research faculty and research administrators. Each session will accommodate up to approximately 120 doctoral and postdoctoral trainees, divided into round tables of 8-10 persons. Faculty mentors and senior research trainees will act as discussion facilitators at tables. Outside "experts" are also invited to participate in some sessions. All facilitators are briefed before each session. Each case is introduced by the session leaders, then each table discusses the case study and engages in specified role-play exercises designed to highlight key considerations. After each discussion period, the session leaders facilitate a large group discussion, soliciting reports and emphasizing key considerations and basic standards of research integrity.
