For the “standard” REB process,
the form is titled “Research Involving Humans Application” and that’s the one
you will most likely be using for your research project, whether you expect to
be undergoing a delegated review or a full board review. The other forms that I
will describe below are used for unique situations and are designed to save you
time by either shortening the form or requiring you to fill out fewer forms
(keep reading for details). As part of your “normal” REB application, there is
also the “Internal Researcher Institutional Permission” form which Stephanie
(and sometimes also Elaine) will need to sign to grant you permission to
proceed with the project (this is done prior to REB review/approval). And finally,
then there is a “Study Completion” form which you will need to submit at the
end of your project in order to close your file with the REB.
If your research involves
multiple colleges or universities (e.g., you’re collaborating with a faculty
member from another school or you’re collecting data from multiple institutions
of higher education) you would use either the “Ontario Community College
Multi-Site Application” (if the other institution(s) is/are all Ontario
colleges) or the “Multi-Jurisdictional Research” (if the other institution(s) include(s)
Canadian universities or Canadian colleges outside of Ontario). Prior to these
forms, researchers had to complete each institution’s unique REB application
form, but these forms allow researchers to complete one form and submit that
same form to the multiple institutions’ REBs. You would use the same “Internal
Researcher Institutional Permission” and “Study Completion” forms as with the
standard application process.
The “Secondary Use of Data” form
is used when your research project involves data that are either publicly
available (e.g., archives, Statistics Canada or other public database, etc.) or
data that have been previously collected for a different purpose (e.g., a
previous semester’s student performance that you realize now could answer a
research question you have; or a previous research project (or projects) that
you’d like to combine and/or re-analyse in a different way). In these cases,
you may not need to obtain informed consent from participants (though you may
need to- stay tuned as this will be the topic of next edition!) Because the
data have already been collected, there is inherently less risk to participants
and so this form is quite a bit shorter than the standard REB form. Although
you still need the include the institutional permission form, there is no study
completion form required.
One final type of application is
the “Course-Based Research Request for Ethical Approval A” (aka Form A) for
course-based research. This is typically done in May the year before the course-based
research would be started. In addition to this form, students will need to
complete the “Course-Based Research Student Application to Involved Human
Participants B” (aka form B) during the semester in which they are completing
the project. There is also a completion form (“Course-Based Study Completion
Form”) for course-based research. The details are outlined in the research ethics
policy (section
5.12).
Regardless of the type of
application and forms you will be using, if you need to change or extend your
study approval beyond the 1-year approval, you’ll use the “Change renew
Request” form. Lastly, if you experience any unanticipated issues during your
study, you must let the REB know immediately with the “Unanticipated Issues
Reporting” form. The REB has also produced a number of templates (available
under the “Resources”
section; just scroll down to the “Templates” section). These templates were
created to help you submit appropriate documents and include consent forms, an
email to recruit participants, a confidentiality waiver for focus groups, and a
transcriber confidentially agreement.
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