Page 48 - Academic and Research Book_WEB

7. Research involving animals;

8. Research misconduct, and
9. Conflict of interest and commitment. (ibid., p. 25).
But the institutions are expected to develop their own codes.

The Indian Sociological Society too has a code of ethics that is easily accessible on its website. It is
2
however only a brief three-page document that does not elaborate on ethical issues in research nor the
various responsibilities of the researcher.

The National Institute of Advanced Science (NIAS) is among the small number of research institutions
3
in academia that have a set of ethical guidelines. It has a well-developed code that is wide ranging and
is available on their website. Several Central Universities have their own codes of ethics, most focus
on plagiarism and data dissemination rather than the conduct of research, the rights of participants or
the need to prevent harm, and so on.

What about research ethics in social science disciplines other than sociology? In 1986, Amartya Sen
gave a series of lectures under the Royer Lecture series at the University of California, Berkeley on
‘Ethics and Economics’, put together as a small volume that the Foreword by John M. Letiche calls
“A terse synthesis of the relevant literature on ethics and economics”. In the course of this series of
talks, Sen pointed out that a ‘distancing’ had occurred between ethics and economics and called for
determined inclusion of ethics in economics that he said would infinitely benefit economics, especially
welfare economics, but also how the study of ethics may benefit from economics. The lucidly written
volume drew considerable debate and had an impact on current thinking on ethics in economic
research praxis (Sen, 1989).
In a wide-ranging public discussion prompted by the award of the Nobel Prize in Economics to
two development economists who developed and used RCTs, there has been a clamour for a law
to be enacted and a regulator to be designated for ethical conduct in social science research. See
for instance, Ila Patnaik’s column in The Print (2017) where a particular focus on the issue of RCTs
prompts an impetus to develop research ethics codes. (See Box 1).
However, one might venture to say that research ethics appears to weigh less in economics than say, in
sociology. At the least, it is most evident in sociology and those branches of economics that impinge
on sociology. Where multidisciplinary methods and perspectives are involved, there is generally a
well-structured code of research ethics. For instance, the Economic and Social Research Council, UK
(ESRC) has a most comprehensive code of research ethics and a website that features important issues
and dilemmas in research.

Codes of ethics have also been formulated in the humanities. In psychology for instance, the code is
far more detailed than any other discipline and leans towards codes in medical research and practice.
A big impetus for the growing interest in ethics in social science research has come from the
expanding area of health- and welfare-related research, notwithstanding the fact that social scientists,
such as Emmerich (op.cit.), have argued for viewing ethical practice in social sciences quite differently
from biomedical and health sciences.

A comprehensive code of ethics across social science is yet to develop in India. To fill this gap in
ethical guidelines for social science research in health studies, a National Committee for Ethics
in Social Science Research in Health (NCESSRH) was set up in 2000 that formulated such a set of
guidelines This was later revised and expanded as The Draft Code of Ethics for Research in Social
Sciences and Social Science Research in 2004 (NCESSRH, 2004). and prompted the Indian Council

ACADEMIC INTEGRITY AND RESEARCH QUALITY | 37