Work

IRB Member Judgments of Decisional Capacity, Coercion, and Risk in Medical and Psychiatric Studies

Year: 2008

Type: article

Abstract: WHILE INDIVIDUALS WITH PSYCHIATRIC illnesses are widely considered a special class of research subjects regarding decisional capacity and coercion vulnerability, those with physical illnesses often are not. IRB members (N = 127) read vignettes that described clinical research targeting one of two levels of disease severity (high/low) for psychiatric or medical diagnoses. They then rated decisional capacity, coercion, and risks for hypothetical research subjects. IRB members viewed psychiatric subjects as having greater vulnerability to coercion and less decisional capacity than medical subjects, even when medical illness was of a severity likely to engender psychiatric comorbidities. These results suggest that IRB members may inflate the vulnerability and decisional incapacity of psychiatric subjects, while discounting vulnerability and incapacity in medical subjects.

Source: Journal of Empirical Research on Human Research Ethics

DOI: 10.1525/jer.2008.3.1.15

Authors: Rebecca Luebbert, Raymond C. Tait, John T. Chibnall, Teresa L. Deshields

Institutions: Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, Saint Louis University, Barnes-Jewish Hospital

Language: English

Topic: Ethics in Clinical Research

Subfield: Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health

Field: Medicine

Domain: Health Sciences

SDG: Good health and well-being

Open Access status: green

Funder: National Institute of Mental Health