The School of Health and Life Sciences is committed to the pursuit of excellence in teaching, research and knowledge transfer across the disciplines of health, nursing and social care, biological and biomedical sciences, psychology and vision sciences.
Step 1
Guidelines for Completing the EC1 Form and Student Documentation
When conducting research with human participants, researchers must adhere to the following principles:
Minimising Harm: Researchers should minimise the risk of causing physical harm or mental distress to participants. Topics that may cause distress should only be addressed with the involvement of specialised staff and a comprehensive risk assessment.
Informed Consent and Respect: Participants volunteer to participate and should be treated with respect. They must be adequately informed about the research project, including its aim, their role, the necessity of their participation, data handling procedures, and the purpose and usage of the data. Participants should also know they may withdraw from the study at any time. Their identities must be protected through anonymisation, and data should be managed according to data protection legislation and GCU policies.
Deception in Research: If the research design requires deceiving participants about the true purpose of the study, this must be thoroughly justified in the protocol, and adequate debriefing must be provided.
Key Considerations for Your Ethics Application
Step 2
Write EC1 form and study documents (Documents available to download here)
