Completing an Ethics application
Researchers must assess whether his/her procedures may cause physical, psychological or social or economic harm to participants and provide a detailed description of the precautions that will be taken to safeguard the participants (e.g., informing participants, providing contact information). Special procedures, which may include providing resources and/or reporting to authorities, must be followed in the case of potential harm to self, harm to others, or child abuse.
If the true purpose of the experiment, or other similar information is altered, then deception is used.If your study involves deception, then your ethics application should include a description of the nature of the deception, why it must be used, the procedures that will be used to protect the participants (e.g., explanation in the debriefing of the nature of the deception and why it was necessary, such as getting participants’ natural responses). In some disciplines, a debriefing document should also be included that explains full details of the deception to participants. In addition, the REB requires that once the true purpose of the study is revealed at the end of the project, that the researchers must explicitly offer participants the opportunity to 1) withdraw their data from the study and 2) to consent a second time to the use of their data.