Researchers at the Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences (FPPW) should adhere to general ethical research principles:

• Within the FPPW, the General Ethical Protocol (GEP) is the ethical guideline for scientific research. A must read!
• For a selection of codes of conduct and reference works on ethical principles, see this page.
• The central website also has a section devoted to ethics in scientific research.

The Ethical Committee

The task of the FPPW Ethics Committee is to advise researchers on ethical issues and review research applications. The mission statement of the Ethics Committee is described in the AEP.

To do justice to various traditions of research, the FPPW Ethics Committee is composed of members from all departments. The chair is Prof. Thierry Marchant and the secretary is Prof. Melissa Tuytens.

• Mission statement EC
• Composition of the EC

Applying for ethical approval

Before you start

• Read the General Ethical Protocol thoroughly.
• Consider whether ethical approval is necessary. A list of situations in which it is necessary to obtain approval from the FPPW Ethics Committee can be found in the General Ethical Protocol.
• In some cases it is necessary to apply to another commission (e.g. the Medical Ethics Committee). More information on this can be found in the introduction of the General Ethical Protocol.
• Please note that only applications of approved projects will be assessed. Applications related to projects that have not yet been submitted or are still waiting for approval (e.g. by the FWO) will not be assessed by the ethics committee.
• Applications concerning master's theses are to be submitted by the supervisor.

Submitting an application

• Fill out the Specific Ethical Protocol (SEP).
• Complete the file with all necessary documents (see checklist in SEP).
• Forward the full file to ec.pp@UGent.be.

To get an idea of what a typical application file looks like, some examples are provided inspired by real applications .

What is the procedure for applications?

• The deadline for submitting an application to the Ethics Committee is always the 15th of each month.
• There is no deadline in July: all applications submitted between 16 June and 15 August will be processed in September.
• Feedback on an application normally follows around the 15th of the following month..
• For each application, the EC is represented by a panel of 3 reviewers and an editor. They review the application autonomously but can decide to submit the file to the full EC in case of complex ethical issues.

Only complete files are admissible. To avoid unnecessary delay in the face of uncertainty (about what the Ethics Committee expects; about issues that might raise ethical concerns; about specific questions from the SEP), researchers are invited to contact the Chair of the EC prior to submitting an Ethics application.

The EC makes every effort to ensure that the procedure runs as smoothly as possible. The approval of a file can sometimes, depending on the difficulty of the questions and remarks of the reviewers, take longer than the set month. Take this into account when planning!

Rules, protocols & templates

• The General Ethical Protocol
• The Specific Ethical Protocol
• Informed consent: templates and examples

Tips & points of interest

• The use of legal grounds 'public interest' and 'consent' when collecting personal data
• GDPR and research