Research ethics

General guidelines

For undergraduate and graduate students conducting research with human participants exclusively for pedagogical purposes (i.e. to provide them with exposure to research methods in their field of study, as is typically the case with Research Methods courses, or interviews done to inform undergraduate term papers), please contact the Departmental Research Ethics Committee.

For undergraduate and graduate students conducting research with human participants where there is an expectation that the work will be rigorous enough to satisfy the scholarly standards of the discipline (i.e. this typically includes research for theses and dissertations), a Summary Protocol Form (SPF) must be submitted to the Office of Research. Research deemed to be of minimal risk will be reviewed vie expedited review by members of the College of Ethics Reviewers (CER), while research deemed to involve more than minimal risk (as outlined by the TCPS and/or Civil Code of Quebec) will be reviewed in Full by the Human Research Ethics Committee (HREC).

*For undergraduate and graduate students conducting research under the auspice of a Faculty member’ HREC approved research program, review is not required (unless their research deviates from the original protocol, example, additional procedures are added or modified- in which case the supervising researcher is required to submit a modification request to the HREC).