Ethical Issues of Informed Consent: Students as Participants in Faculty Research

Educators may face an ethical dilemma when they conduct research by using their own students as participants. The dual role conflict, coercion, confidentiality, misconstruction, and unawareness of the informed consent documents have been discussed as ethical issues in such faculty research. The educators as the researchers should be aware of these ethical dilemmas and attempt to implement the informed consent effectively. Thus, this article explores the ethical considerations of informed consent for the educational setting that students are recruited in the faculty research. Furthermore, this article represented recommendations for potentially resolving the ethical dilemmas of informed consent surrounding this phenomenon which consisted of eliminating dual role conflict and coercion, guarding confidentiality, and promoting good construction and awareness of the informed consent documents.