Research Ethics and Oversight

I began working on issues related to research ethics and oversight while working in the Division of Medical Ethics at New York University and continued to do so while working at the Ethox Centre at the University of Oxford. Collaborative papers I have written on this topic include an evaluation of the Belmont Report in relation to the state of research ethics today, an examination of issues faced by the many novel regulatory bodies (e.g., conflict of interest committees, data safety monitoring boards) that have been developed in in the realm of research oversight, and a discussion of how research ethics and oversight ought to proceed in response to developing neurotechnologies. My current work in this area explores how mechanisms of research oversight differ within academia and industry and what role communities ought to have in the regulation of research.

I am also part of an international working group seeking to examine justifications underlying participatory research and oversight. My work in this realm has centered around case studies involving psychiatric research, Indigenous communities, and other marginalized communities.

Representative Papers:

• Friesen, P., Kearns, L., Redman, B., & Caplan, A. L. (2017). Rethinking the Belmont Report? The American Journal of Bioethics.

• Friesen, P., Redman, B., & Caplan, A. L. (2018) Of Straws, Camels, Research Regulation, and IRBs. Therapeutic Innovation and Regulatory Science.

Recent/ Forthcoming Papers:

• Friesen, P., Yusof, A., Sheehan, M. (2019) Should the Decisions of Institutional Review Boards be Consistent? Ethics and Human Research.

• Friesen, P., & O’Leary, K. (2019). Machine learning and suicide prevention: considering context as a guide to ethical design, Mental Health as Public Health: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on the Ethics of Prevention, Eds. Cratsley, K., and Radden, J., Elsevier.

Recent/ Upcoming Talks:

• “Don’t Worry: Facebook is Figuring it out for us” (April 2020) at Big Data Challenges for Ethics Review Committees, Health Ethics and Policy Lab, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Zurich (by Zoom)

• “Co-producing research: Epistemic and ethical justifications” (May 2019) with Dunn, M. at Beyond Engagement? PPI in Health Research, University of Edinburgh