Viewing research participation as a moral obligation: In whose interests?

Hastings Center Report

Volumn 41, Issue 2, 2011, Pages 40-47

  Rennie, Stuart ^a  

^a NONE

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

ARTICLE; ETHICAL THEORY; HEALTH; HEALTH BEHAVIOR; HEALTH STATUS; HUMAN; INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION; MEDICAL RESEARCH; MORALITY; POVERTY; RESEARCH SUBJECT; SOCIAL BEHAVIOR;

BIOMEDICAL RESEARCH; ETHICAL THEORY; HEALTH BEHAVIOR; HEALTH STATUS; HUMANS; INTERNATIONALITY; MORAL OBLIGATIONS; POVERTY; RESEARCH SUBJECTS; SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY; WORLD HEALTH;

EID: 79953080355     PISSN: 00930334     EISSN: 1552146X     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1353/hcr.2011.0025     Document Type: Article

References (26)

1. J. Harris, "Scientific Research Is a Moral Duty," Journal of Medical Ethics 31, no. 4 (2005): 242-48. (Pubitemid 40542138)
2. R. Rhodes, "Rethinking Research Ethics," American Journal of Bioethics 5, no. 1 (2005): 7-28; (Pubitemid 41674014)
3. R. Rhodes, "In Defense of the Duty to Participate in Biomedical Research," American Journal of Bioethics 8, no. 10 (2008): 37-38.
4. G.O. Schaefer, E.J. Emanuel, and A. Wertheimer, "The Obligation to Participate in Biomedical Research," Journal of the American Medical Association 302 (2009): 67-72.
5. Harris, "Scientific Research Is a Moral Duty"; Schaefer, Emanuel, and Wertheimer, "The Obligation to Participate in Biomedical Research."
6. If a (good) moral reason to do X always equals a moral obligation to do X, and persons must always fulfill moral obligations whenever they can, the result is an overly demanding conception of morality. The distinction between having good moral reasons and having moral obligations protects a person's ability to pursue his or her own commitments, values, and projects without necessarily being immoral. Bernard Williams made this point in his classic essay "A Critique of Utilitarianism," in Utilitarianism, For and Against, ed. J.J.C. Smart and B. Williams (Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press, 1990), 82-117.
7. S. Wolf, "Moral Obligations and Social Commands," in Metaphysics and the Good: Themes from the Philosophy of Robert Merrihew Adams, ed. S. Newlands and L. Jorgensen, (Oxford, U.K.: Oxford University Press, 2009), 343-67.
8. Proponents of these arguments may in fact be working to change social expectations and thereby paving the way for research participation to be regarded as morally obligatory. But this position of advocacy differs from how they present their arguments, which is as being in favor of a moral obligation that already exists.
9. I. Brassington, "John Harris' Argument for a Duty to Research," Bioethics 21, no. 3 (2007): 160-68. (Pubitemid 46233005)
10. S. Benatar, "Moral Imagination: The Missing Component in Global Health," PLoS Medicine 2, no. 12 (2005): e40.
11. J.E. Bekelman, Y. Li, and P.C. Gross, "Scope and Impact of Financial Conflicts of Interest in Biomedical Research: A Systematic Review," Journal of the American Medical Association 289 (2003): 454-65. (Pubitemid 36119966)
12. For a particularly egregious example of the latter involving antidepressants for adolescents, see The People of the State of New York v. GlaxoSmithKline (2004) at http://news.findlaw.com/cnn/docs/glaxo/ nyagglaxo60204cmp.pdf.
13. Rhodes, "In Defense of the Duty to Participate in Biomedical Research.
14. G.O. Schaefer, E.J. Emanuel, and A. Wertheimer, "Participating in Biomedical Research" (letter), Journal of the American Medical Association 302 (2009): 2202.
15. M. Marmot, "Social Determinants of Health Inequalities," Lancet 365 (2005): 1005-6.
16. S. Shapshay and K.D. Pimple, "Participation in Biomedical Research Is an Imperfect Moral Duty: A Response to John Harris," Journal of Medical Ethics 33, no. 7 (2007): 414-17.
17. A. Petryna, When Experiments Travel: Clinical Trials and the Global Search for Human Subjects (Princeton, N.J., and Oxford, U.K.: Princeton University Press, 2009).
18. Schaefer, Emanuel, and Wertheimer, "The Obligation to Participate in Biomedical Research."
19. Ibid.
20. Ibid.
21. Ibid.
22. Participants in the 2001 Conference on Ethical Aspects of Research in Developing Countries, "Ethics: Fair Benefits for Research in Developing Countries," Science 298 (2002): 2133-34.
23. D.W. Fitzgerald and F.M. Behets, "A Piece of My Mind: Beyond Folklore," Journal of the American Medical Association 288 (2002): 2791-92.
24. A. Ho, "Correcting Social Ills through Mandatory Research Participation," American Journal of Bioethics 8, no. 10 (2008): 39-40.
25. H. Jonas, "Philosophical Reflections on Experimenting with Human Subjects," Daedalus 98, no. 2 (1969): 219-47.
26. Shapsay and Pimple, "Participation in Biomedical Research Is an Imperfect Moral Duty"; A. Sen, "Elements of a Theory of Human Rights," Philosophy and Public Affairs 32, no. 4 (2004): 315-56.