RECRUITING PARTICIPANTS
1. Be prepared to meet people who do not trust research.

Some people have heard bad things about research. For example, many people know about unethical research in the Tuskegee syphilis experiments. Some of the other stories people have heard are true and some of them are not.

The Tuskegee Syphilis Study, carried out in Macon County, Alabama, from 1932 to 1972, is an example of medical research gone wrong. The United States Public Health Service, in trying to learn more about syphilis and justify treatment programs for blacks, withheld adequate treatment from a group of poor black men who had the disease, causing needless pain and suffering for the men and their loved ones.

In the wake of the Tuskegee Study and other studies, government took a closer look at research involving human subjects and made changes to prevent the moral breaches that occurred in Tuskegee from happening again.

From the Centers for Disease Control Website.

People are concerned about many things. People get upset when they think that researchers take advantage of people of color, or that researchers take information and give nothing back. People worry that researchers lie about how they will use personal information. Some people also worry that when the research is over they will lose some of the services they receive.

We have strict ethical standards for research. Research involving people must be approved by an ethics board called an Institutional Review Board (IRB). There are penalties for breaking the rules. Depending on the situation, projects can be shut down and researchers can lose their jobs. (Click here for more information.)

Be prepared to explain to research participants that there are rules protecting people who participate in research.

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