Citi Training
Researchers designing online studies should consider the following with respect to participant protections.
Re-identification methods are unique to internet-based research.
Additional safeguards that may be included in a social and behavioral study may include:
Remove all direct identifiers from the data as soon as possible.
A study was submitted to the IRB designed to evaluate the effect of background noise on an individual's ability to concentrate and answer questions. The IRB approved the study and consent form. The consent form includes all the required information. The use of a consent form is an example of the Belmont principle of:
Respect for persons (subjects understand that participation is voluntary and that they are provided detailed information about the study before giving consent to participate)
What statement about risks in social and behavioral sciences research is most accurate:
Risks are specific to time, situation, and culture.
In addition to pregnant women, fetuses, and neonates, another subpart of the HHS regulations provides additional protections for which of the following vulnerable populations?
Prisoners
The researcher's failure to protect research subjects from deductive disclosure of identity (that is, the re-identification of subjects by other researchers) is the primary ethical violation in which of the following studies?
"Tastes, Ties, and Time (T3)" study
According to the federal regulations, which of the following studies meets the definition of research with human subjects?
A cognitive psychologist enrolls undergraduate students for a computer-based study about the effect of mood on problem-solving behaviors.
According to the federal regulations, which of the following studies meets the definition of research with human subjects?
A developmental psychologist videotapes interactions between groups of toddlers and their caregivers to determine which intervention methods most effectively manage aggression.
Which of the following constitutes both a breach of confidentiality (the research data have been disclosed, counter to the agreement between researcher and subjects) and a violation of subjects' privacy (the right of the individuals to be protected against intrusion into their personal lives or affairs)?
A faculty member makes identifiable data about sexual behavior available to graduate students, although the subjects were assured that the data would be de-identified.
Which of the following on-line research strategies raises the most concerns regarding the ethical principle of respecting the autonomy of research subjects and the corresponding federal regulations requiring informed consent?
A researcher proposes to join a moderated support group for cancer survivors posing as a survivor. She plans to insert comments to see how the members respond.
A criterion for waiving informed consent is that, when appropriate, subjects are provided additional pertinent information after the study. In which of the following studies would it NOT be appropriate to provide subjects with information about missing elements of consent:
A study in which subjects were assigned to study activities based on an undesirable or unflattering physical characteristic as assessed by members of the research team.
Identify the example of when situation and time are key to assessing risk of harm in a research study:
A study on the efficacy of a behavioral intervention for smoking cessation that involves both adults and teenagers in the United States
Additional protections researchers can include in their practice to protect subject privacy and data confidentiality include:
All of the above
The provisions of Subpart D, of the HHS regulations, Additional Protections for Children Involved as Subjects in Research apply to:
All research funded by HHS
Parental notification, in lieu of active parental permission, is allowed when:
An IRB has approved a waiver of the requirement for parental permission.
Which of the following is the least important activity when protecting human subjects in international research?
Assessing transportation conditions
The following category of research was added to the "Exempt Research" section at 46.104:
Benign behavioral interventions
Which of the following examples of using the internet to conduct research meets the federal definition of research with human subjects?
Conducting an on-line focus group with cancer survivors to determine familial support systems. The researcher also invites subjects' significant others to be a part of the focus group.
To minimize potential risks of harm, a researcher conducting an on-line survey can:
Design the survey so that no direct or indirect identifiers are collected.
Which of the following is an example of how the principle of beneficence is applied to a study involving human subjects?
Ensuring that risks are reasonable in relationship to anticipated benefits
In addition to the general provisions of the Common Rule (the federal regulations for protecting research subjects), the following regulations also govern research in the public schools:
FERPA, PPRA, and Subpart D of the federal regulations
Which of the following statements most accurately describes the requirement for the documentation of minors' assent to participate in research?
Federal regulations do not require the documentation of minors' assent.
Research approved on 1 September 2019 conducted by a regulated entity would be subject to:
Final Rule (2018 Requirements)
The Final Rule made revisions to the following definition:
Human subject
A researcher proposes to conduct a study at a foreign site. The research has been determined to be exempt from the federal regulations by institutional policy. According to federal regulations, is review required at the foreign site?
If a proposed study qualifies for exemption, federal regulations do not require review at the foreign site where it will be conducted.
What are some considerations for a U.S. researcher conducting a study in a non-U.S. setting when obtaining informed consent from subjects?
In addition to the consent of the research subjects, are there other individuals or groups whose permission must be sought?
Broad consent for storage, maintenance, and secondary research use may be obtained:
In lieu of a full informed consent
Researchers endeavoring to conduct an on-line study should consider that there are some potential risks of harm to subjects unique to internet-based research. One of these risks is:
Individuals may post private identifiable information about themselves on-line without intending it to be public and available to researchers.
Researchers must report potential unanticipated problems that involve risks to others directly to the:
Institutional Review Board (IRB)
According to the Belmont Report, the requirement that the benefits and burdens of the research are equitably distributed, expresses the principle of:
Justice
An example cited in the Belmont Report (The National Commission 1979) stated that "During the 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." This is an example of a violation of which Belmont principle?
Justice
A researcher submits a study to the IRB that proposes to evaluate a new after-school on-line tutoring program for middle-school students in a local school district examining the effect on student grades. She proposes to perform this assessment at the school that her children attend, because she is familiar with the school district. Students may use either their personal smartphone or computer to participate in the program. This study might be determined to be violating which principle of the Belmont Report?
Justice (requires that the benefits and burdens of research are equitably distributed and subject populations are not chosen because of convenience.)
The age of majority in international research is determined by the
Laws, customs, and norms in the area in which the research will be conducted.
The definition of "research" was expanded to:
List activities that are specifically deemed not to be research
Continuing review of an approved and ongoing study posing more than minimal risk that was initially approved by a convened IRB:
Must occur within 12 months of the approval date.
A researcher conducts a focus group to learn about attitudes towards hygiene and disease prevention. Two weeks after the focus group, the researcher learns one of the subjects had a heart attack at home and was hospitalized, but made a full recovery. Based on HHS regulations, should the researcher report this event to the IRB?
No, this does not need to be reported because it is unrelated to participation in the study.
Which of the following activities constitutes engagement in research?
Obtaining informed consent and conducting research interviews.
According to the federal regulations, human subjects are living individuals about whom an investigator conducting research obtains information through interaction or intervention with the individual, and uses, studies, or analyzes the information; or:
Obtains, uses, studies, analyzes, or generates identifiable private information.
Which of the following statements about the relationship between an institution and the institution's IRB(s) is correct?
Officials of the institution may overrule an IRB approval.
The purpose of the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) is to:
Provide parents certain rights over their children's educational records.
If the research is subject to Subpart D, which of the following research activities with children would qualify for an exemption under Category 2 (research that includes educational tests, surveys, interviews, observation)?
Research about aptitude testing
What consideration should researchers take into account when designing an online study that presents participants with misleading information?
Researchers cannot guarantee that participants reached the end of the study, and read and understood the debrief.
The Final Rule revised the definition of "written or in writing" to clarify:
That these terms include electronic formats
According to the federal regulations, research is eligible for exemption, if:
The research falls into one of eight categories of research activity described in the regulations.
According to Subpart D, research with children may be eligible for exemption under Category 2 when:
The research involves the use of educational tests
When a focus group deals with a potentially sensitive topic, which of the following statements about providing confidentiality to focus group participants is correct?
The researcher cannot control what participants repeat about others outside the group.
The compliance date for cooperative review is:
Three years from publishing the 2017 Final Rule in the Federal Register
A study that involves interviews of adults is eligible for expedited review. The researcher wants to add an adolescent population (aged 12 to 17) to the study and has designed a parental permission and assent process. No additional changes are planned. Which of the following statements about review of the revised protocol is accurate?
Unless the nature of the questions would raise the level of risk to more than minimal for adolescents, the research would still qualify for expedited review.
When would an IRB consider the risks of a study to be controlled?
When there is an appropriate risk mitigation and management plan in place.
The procedures for reporting potential unanticipated problems involving risk to subjects or others to the IRB are:
Determined by the institution in its written policies and procedures
Which of the following is an example of how the principle of beneficence can be applied to a study employing human subjects?
Determining that the study has a maximization of benefits and a minimization of risks.
A therapist at a free university clinic treats elementary school children with behavior problems who are referred by a social service agency. She is also a doctoral candidate who proposes using data she has and will collect about the children for a case-based research project. Which of the following statements about parental permission is correct?
The parents of the children might feel pressure to give permission to the therapist to use their children's data so that she will continue to provide services to their children.
Data lifecycle management refers to what?
The ongoing oversight of research data by the researchers for the study's duration
A researcher wishes to study generational differences in coping mechanisms among adults who experienced abuse as children. Adequate measures will be instituted to obtain informed consent and ensure that there is no breach of confidentiality. The most likely additional risk is that some subjects may:
Experience emotional or psychological distress.
What is passive mobile data collection?
Data collection that occurs on the device that the researcher and participant are unaware of
Which federal regulation or law governs how researchers can obtain data about subjects' disciplinary status in school from academic records?
The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act.
The specific U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) regulations that apply to research with children are known as Subpart D: Additional Protections for Children Involved as Subjects in Research.
True
Revelations about the Facebook Emotional Contagion study highlights what key ethical consideration to conducting research using social media?
Users of social media sites, like Facebook, may not fully understand all of the terms to which they are agreeing to when accepting a sites' terms of use.
A professor at Big State University proposes to study attitudes about obesity in Chile by giving subjects in Chile surveys to complete. Which is a question that the Big State University IRB should ask the researcher in order to determine if this study should be reviewed by a local Chilean IRB or ethics committee, as well as the Big State University IRB?
Will the researchers have collaborators at the research site abroad?
A researcher wants to observe preschoolers at a local public playground to evaluate levels of cooperation. The researcher will not interact with the children or record information in such a manner that the identity of the subjects can be readily ascertained. Which of the following statements is true?
This research would be eligible for exemption because the researcher is not interacting with the children and the playground is a public setting.
A graduate student wants to examine the effect of print media versus televised media on individuals' position on several social issues. The superintendent of a local work release facility, a family friend, will allow the graduate student access to the prison population to help her quickly accrue subjects. The student's IRB should:
not be approved because prison population is a convenience sample
According to federal regulations, the expedited review process may be used when the study procedures pose:
No more than minimal risk and the research activities fall within regulatory categories identified as eligible.
The Belmont Report's principle of respect for persons incorporates at least two ethical convictions: first, that individuals should be treated as autonomous agents, and second, that
Persons with diminished autonomy are entitled to protection
A medical record is an example of:
Private information
What procedures must be described in an agreement called an "assurance of compliance" with a U.S. federal agency?
Procedures in place that ensure that subjects will be protected in a manner commensurate with the Common Rule, including review by an independent committee comparable to an IRB.
In a longitudinal study that will follow children from kindergarten through high school and will collect information about illegal activities, which of the following confidentiality procedures would protect against compelled disclosure of individually identifiable information?
Securing a Certificate of Confidentiality
A waiver of the requirement for documentation of informed consent may be granted when:
The only record linking the subject and the research is the consent document and the principal risk is a breach of confidentiality.
How can a Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) study approach reduce or mitigate technology-related risks?
The participant may already know the risks of using the device if they are familiar with it for personal use. This decision indicates a level of pre-research risk acceptance.
A researcher is studying women recently admitted to a state prison. All potential subjects must have children under the age of five. Research subjects will be given a basket of toys to use at their children's first visit that the children can then take home. In assessing this proposal, the IRB needs to determine that the toys are:
Not an excessive incentive.
Which of the following studies is linked most directly to the establishment of the National Research Act in 1974 and ultimately to the Belmont Report and federal regulations for human subject protection?
PHS Tuskegee Study
The internet can be used as a research tool or as the object of a study. Which of the following examples best describes an investigator using the internet as a research tool?
An investigator uses his Facebook wall to post a URL link to a survey he is hosting on SurveyMonkey.
Why are institutionally provisioned technology systems (in other words, systems provided through a university, hospital, or clinic) generally more secure than consumer products?
Because information technology professionals have vetted them with the vendor.
Why do custom-built, homegrown, and/or investigational technologies pose the greatest risk to research participants?
Because researchers cannot know all the potential risks until participants have used the technology in practice.
Neither Subpart C (Prisoners) nor Subpart D (Children) applies to juveniles in the correctional systems because wardens of juvenile prisoners (unlike those for adult prisoners) act in loco parentis for juvenile offenders. This statement is false because:
Both subparts apply, as these individuals are under the legal age of consent and are incarcerated
A researcher conducting behavioral research collects individually identifiable sensitive information about illicit drug use and other illegal behaviors by surveying college students. One of the subjects is in an automobile accident two weeks after participating in the research study. Is this an example of an unanticipated problem that requires reporting to the IRB?
No, this does not need to be reported because it was assessed by the researcher as unrelated to the research study.
A researcher conducting behavioral research collects individually identifiable sensitive information about illicit drug use and other illegal behaviors by surveying college students. The data are stored on a laptop computer without encryption, and the laptop computer is stolen from the researcher's car on the way home from work. This is an unanticipated problem that must be reported because the incident was (a) unexpected (in other words, the researchers did not anticipate the theft); (b) related to participation in the research; and (c) placed the subjects at a greater risk of psychological and social harm from the breach in confidentiality of the study data than was previously known or recognized. According to OHRP, this unanticipated problem must be reported to the IRB in which timeframe?
Promptly
The two exempt research categories that always require limited IRB review as a condition of exemption are: Storage or maintenance for secondary research for which broad consent is required (Category 7) and which of the following?
Secondary research for which broad consent is required (Category 8)
What existing federal regulations define technology-based risk assessment?
None of the above
A researcher wants to contact former prisoners who are now on parole. She wants to study the difficulty of obtaining employment based on whether the subjects had been convicted of felony versus misdemeanor crimes. She needs to:
Do nothing in regards the Subpart C because the research does not meet the criteria for prison research -- individuals on parole are not considered prisoners. The definition applies to both minors and adults.
The primary purpose of a Certificate of Confidentiality is to:
Protect identifiable research information from compelled disclosure.
Which of the following statements about prison research is true?
Researchers may study the effects of privilege upgrades awarded by the prison.
A general requirement for informed consent is that no informed consent may include any exculpatory language. Exculpatory language is that which waives or appears to waive any of the subject's legal rights or releases or appears to release those conducting the research from liability for negligence. Which of the following statements in a consent form is an example of exculpatory language?
Taking part in the research is voluntary, but if you choose to take part, you waive the right to legal redress for any research-related injuries.
A professor at Big State University is writing a biography about Bill Gates and conducting oral histories with all of Bill Gates' friends, family members, and business acquaintances. The researcher submits the research proposal to the institution's IRB. What action can he expect by the IRB?
The IRB will not review this study because it is not research as defined by the federal regulations.
A researcher asks an IRB to waive the requirement for parental permission for a study conducted in schools because the nature of the research requires participation of all the children present in classrooms on the day the research will take place. Assuming that the basic research design could be approved by the IRB and the school, which of the following requirements must be met before an IRB could waive parental permission?
The research must pose no more than minimal risk.
Which scenario best describes a researcher making thoughtful considerations in the design of their informed consent process on an online study?
The researcher will ask for a waiver to document informed consent and instead will have a live button that reads, "If you agree to be in this study click below to begin."
PPRA gives parents some level of control over their child's:
Participation in third-party survey research or exposure to instructional materials developed by researchers
As part of the consent process, the federal regulations require researchers to:
Provide potential subjects with information at the appropriate reading comprehension level.
The Final Rule added a definition for three new terms, including: clinical trial, written or in writing, and:
Public health authority
A census is a regularly-occurring and official count of a particular population. Census data available at the United States Census Bureau website are an example of:
Public information
Consent to participate in research is an ongoing process. Which of the following strategies would help ensure that participation in a survey about a sensitive personal topic remains voluntary throughout a study?
Designing the survey so that subjects are not forced to answer one question before going to the next.
You learn that one of the subjects from your study will be admitted to prison next week. You assert that it is in the best interest of the subject to remain in the study while incarcerated. However, the study was not approved by the IRB in accordance with the requirements for research involving prisoners under Subpart C. What is the best course of action?
Notify the IRB promptly and allow the subject to remain in the study while the IRB makes the determinations required by the regulations.
Which of the following methods could be considered a "best practice" in terms of informing respondents how their answers to an on-line survey about personal information will be protected?
The investigator uses the informed consent process to explain how respondent data will be transmitted from the website to his encrypted database without ever recording respondents' IP addresses, but explains that on the internet confidentiality cannot be absolutely guaranteed.
According to OHRP, a problem is an "unanticipated problem" when it meets which of the following criteria:
Unexpected, related or possibly related to the research, suggests the research puts subjects or others at greater risk
A researcher is interested in assessing risk-taking by individuals. The researcher is sitting on a bench near a busy four-way stop intersection. She plans on recording the number of bike riders wearing a safety helmet and whether they stop at the intersection before proceeding in order to correlate use of safety apparel with risk-taking. This collection of information is an example of:
Public behavior
A researcher wants to do a web-based survey of college students to collect information about their sexual behavior and drug use. Direct identifiers will not be collected; however, IP addresses may be present in the data set. Risk of harm should be evaluated by:
Both the magnitude (or severity) and the probability (or likelihood) of harm.
Instead of "data will be stored on the researcher's computer," what should a strong data security plan state?
Data will be stored on an encrypted computer with a strong password that only the researcher knows.
Which of the following are the three principles discussed in the Belmont Report?
Respect for Persons, Beneficence, Justice
A researcher leaves a research file in her car while she attends a concert and her car is stolen. The file contains charts of aggregated numerical data from a research study with human subjects, but no other documents. The consent form said that no identifying information would be retained, and the researcher adhered to that component. Which of the following statements best characterizes what occurred?
There was neither a violation of privacy nor a breach of confidentiality.
