Business Theory 501

Please answer original form with a minimum of 250 words and respond to both students on separate pages  with a minimum of 100 words each 

Page 1 Original Forum and references 

page 2 Jason  response and reference 

Page 3 Thomas response and references 

Original Forum

Why are ethical considerations so important in research?  How is paid research as opposed to unpaid research viewed?  Why is there a difference?  Can people be objective if they are paid to conduct research

Student Responses

Jason

Utilizing ethics while conducting research is critical because it prevents bias and eliminates perceived preconceptions about a specific research topic.  I wouldn’t necessarily say paid research has a negative connotation, however paid research when funded by a biased organization or individual can be viewed as dishonest and illegitimate.  Unpaid research conducted for the betterment of society and or academic achievement would, in my mind, typically be more credible.  I would add that paid research by certain organizations can be seen a perfectly acceptable.  I will use a topic from our reading material, if the American Cancer Association paid a group of doctors to conduct research on various effects of treatment options, I could see this as ethical research, barring no doctor was being sponsored by a specific treatment option.  I don’t know that paid versus unpaid research really sways my opinion as much as the intent of the researcher.  

One of the reasons why there is paid and unpaid research is compensation, some research topics could require a skillset that an individual has worked an extended amount of time to achieve and requires compensation for their services.  I see nothing unethical about a researcher requiring compensations for a lifetime of acquired skills and competencies.  I absolutely feel as if researchers can be objective even if they are being paid to conduct research.  Like I mentioned earlier, I don’t necessarily feel as if it is compensation, as much as it is intent.  Our reading material discusses three concepts that begin to explain how we behave or describe the essence of our thought process; social forces, socialization, and norms/sanctions.  I would argue that those three concepts have a larger role in determining if a researcher is objective than compensation.  

Working in government, I see ethical issues constantly.  Once recent example was a 10% travel cut dictated by the head of our organization.  When it trickled down to the folks that were going to execute this reduction, they pulled overinflated baseline data as our start point.  Then told us which data was going to be used at the end point, which didn’t really give an accurate reflection of what was intended.  In the end they canceled the majority of this initiative because of complaints, however some were postured to make it work through a numbers game.  

V/R

Jason P. Penn

Nosich, Gerald M. Learning to Think Things through : A Guide to Critical Thinking across the Curriculum. 4th ed., Boston, Pearson, Cop, 2012.

Thomas 

When conducting research, to me, ethical considerations are one very important aspect especially if the research being conducted is for this type of desired product.  For instance, if one is researching the history of a culture or religion, it could be swayed by ethical or moral beliefs.  What it comes down to I believe is that the person conducting the research has to be cognizant of this and not be swayed by any ethical considerations or personal beliefs unless that is what they are after in the first place, i.e. a swayed result.  We see it all the time in today’s society and on the internet and within all the news sources available to us all.  This of all the polls conducted and the validity of them.  Did the poll taker use ethical decisions when deciding on what to ask and to what group?  Did they take into consideration using an expanse of people or limit to one group?  This to me is how research can get swayed in one direction or another and depending on what we all research for this class or assignment we must consider our sources and ensure that we are not swayed one way or another.  This takes me back to last week when I was responding to a forum post and the writer said we should always try and negate a fact because by doing this we can come to a conclusion that the fact or data is valid or not.

Paid and unpaid research I believe is viewed differently per the research being conducted.  I just performed a simple Google search and it appears that medical types of research seem to be the crux of the matter but no matter what, the consensus is paid research can skew results and integrity while unpaid research results in quantified data from volunteers who have no financial incentive to sway results.  People for the most part are not going to do something for nothing so I have no problem with paid research so long as the data being collected is not misconstrued in some ill manner.

I have seen all sorts of ethical issues in both my life and in the workplace as we all can probably attest to.  One of my favorites is when superiors are looking for a specific answer, the answer they want and they keep asking workers until they receive the response they want.  I see it all the time and it is very disheartening.