Responsible Conduct of Research in Field Ecology

What Doctoral Candidates Ought to Know about the Ethics of Ecological Field Research

by Dr. Thomas R. Wentworth and Ms. Kristen Rosenfeld

Setting the Stage

This instructional module is about the responsible conduct of field research. By research, we mean the activities undertaken by scientists to discover new knowledge about how the world works. These activities follow a well-established protocol called the scientific method, in which scientists begin with careful observation of natural phenomena, guided by general goals and specific objectives. After making sufficient observations, scientists use inductive reasoning to develop hypotheses about the phenomena they are studying. Hypotheses are explanations, and they may be expressed in words or other forms of notation, such as mathematical expressions. Hypotheses lead (through deductive reasoning) to predictions about what will happen under specific circumstances, and these predictions can be tested through appropriately designed experiments. The results of such experiments, if inconsistent with predictions of a particular hypothesis, will cause scientists to reject that hypothesis and to seek alternative explanations. If the results of experiments are consistent with the predictions of a hypothesis, they lend support to that hypothesis, although they do not prove it. Experiments, irrespective of their consequences for a given hypothesis, frequently lead to further observations and the formulation of additional hypotheses, in what can be termed the “cycle of science”.

By field research, we mean research that is conducted in the out-of-doors, beyond the confines of a laboratory or office. Although it is unlikely that any research project would be conducted entirely in the field, we are concerned with the component(s) of a research project that is (are) conducted out-of-doors. Many scientific subdisciplines routinely conduct field research. A few examples include agriculture, botany/plant biology, conservation biology, ecology, entomology, forestry, horticulture, marine science, earth science, atmospheric science, microbiology, systematics, and zoology. Research subjects may be both biotic (e.g., plants, animals, microorganisms), abiotic (e.g., air, water, rocks, minerals, chemical elements), or complexes of biotic and abiotic components (e.g., soils, forests, ponds). From a hierarchical perspective, most field research involves individual organisms, populations of individual species, communities comprised of many species, ecosystems, or even the biosphere. The scale of field research may be small (e.g., an individual animal, the flowers of an individual plant) or large (e.g., an ocean basin, the earth’s atmosphere). Field research may be minimally intrusive (e.g., creating maps from remotely-sensed data) or highly manipulative (e.g., experimental alteration of an entire ecosystem).

By responsible conduct of field research, we mean the ethical conduct of such research. Ultimately, responsible conduct of field research requires that researchers (1) concern themselves with ethical questions concerning their research and (2) make decisions about whether a particular element of a research program is right or wrong. In the process, field researchers make moral decisions about their research; such decisions go well beyond the statement of preferences.

Objectives and Focus of This Module

Field researchers encounter many broad ethical issues shared by all researchers. Most of these issues have been explored thoroughly elsewhere (e.g., Shamoo and Resnik 2003) and it is not our intention to cover these in this module. However, we encourage all field researchers to familiarize themselves with such general issues as:

appropriate collaboration with peer scientists
appropriate collaboration between academic and non-academic entities
mentoring and supervision of junior scientists
appropriate relationships with technical staff and volunteers
recognition of intellectual property
proper acknowledgment and citation of the work of others
appropriate experimental design, data collection, and data analysis
appropriate record-keeping
fabrication, falsification, and suppression of data
harassment and discrimination
conflicts of interest
other relevant ethical issues

Field researchers also encounter ethical issues that may not affect all researchers, but that have also been thoroughly explored elsewhere. Again, we will not cover these in this module, but we encourage field researchers to familiarize themselves with such issues as:

use of human subjects in research
use of non-human vertebrate subjects in research

After addressing the two sets of issues listed above, one might believe that ethical considerations pertaining to field research had been adequately covered. However, we find that there are numerous ethical issues unique to field research and that most of these have received inadequate treatment in the literature. Although our list is not exhaustive, it does include important ethical issues that have been identified through discussions with colleagues and consultation of the literature:

obtaining permission for field research on private lands
obtaining appropriate permits/approvals for field research on public lands
revealing sensitive location information
depleting populations through collection of vouchers or research subjects
manipulating the physical, biological, or cultural environment
conducting research that involves biocides or other toxic or harmful substances
creating enclosures, exclosures, or other restrictions to movements of organisms
eliminating species from portions of their natural ranges
reintroducing species to unoccupied portions of their former range
introducing exotic species
introducing genetically modified organisms
creating gene flow by moving individuals between populations
working with rare, threatened, or endangered species

Our objective in this module is to introduce field researchers to the issues listed above in a single, coherent package, while providing them with insights, tools, and guidance. It is our hope that this information will be of value to both novice and seasoned field researchers alike.

The State of Things

Recent essays [e.g., Farnsworth and Roskovsky (1993) and Minteer and Collins (2005a, 2005b)] have called for development of a comprehensive ethical foundation for guiding ecological research and management of ecological systems (Minteer and Collins 2005a). However, these and other authors (e.g., Marsh and Kenchington 2004) point out that the ecological community has not adequately addressed this important issue. Farnsworth and Roskovsky (1993) argue that several factors may have impeded discussion and development of an ethical foundation for ecological research, including concern about attracting public attention, an assumption that the benefits of research outweigh its negative effects on ecological systems, lack of documentation of such negative effects, and a belief that ecologists inherently understand that certain experiments are inappropriate. Farnsworth and Roskovsky (1993) also proposed a public dialogue between scientists and philosophers aimed at developing an ethical foundation for the conduct of ecological research. Twelve years later, however, Minteer and Collins (2005a) concluded that this dialogue had not yet happened.

Philosophical Underpinnings

This module draws on the traditions of environmental ethics (Taylor 1986), bioethics/biomedical ethics (e.g. The President's Council on Biomedical Ethics 2006), and basic responsible conduct of research (Shamoo & Resnik 2003). However, we focus primarily on the enterprise of research conducted in nature. Our ethical framework aligns most closely with the concept of "ecological ethics" as defined by Minteer & Collins (2005a, 2005b), which include elements from the four domains of environmental ethics, but we expand that concept to incorporate the ideas of Farnsworth & Rosovsky (1993), Marsh & Kenchington (2004), and some of our own.

The first three domains referred to by Minteer & Collins (2005a, 2005b) have been developed in great detail elsewhere and we will not attempt to cover them thoroughly in this module. We hope that you will have already had some exposure to normative ethical theory, examples of which are the deontological theory of Immanuel Kant (conduct guided by moral principles) and the utilitarian theory of Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill (conduct guided by outcomes that provide the greatest good for the greatest number).

In considering contributions from environmental ethics to the developing field of ecological ethics, we have been particularly influenced by Taylor's (1986) biocentric theory. Taylor (1986) suggests that humans should move from a human-centered to a broader, life-centered approach to environmental ethics. Indeed, Taylor (1986) argues that there are really two kinds of environmental ethics, one anthropocentric (based on respect for and duties owed to humans), the other biocentric (based on respect for and duties owed to all living things). Although Taylor (1986) rejects the anthropocentric perspective as the basis for environmental ethics, we will still identify cases where right behavior can be justified solely from an anthropocentric basis. Taylor’s (1986) main thesis is that, just as humans have moral duties toward other human beings, humans also have moral duties toward nonhuman forms of life. In particular, he argues that these nonhuman forms of life are to be treated with respect because they are entities that possess inherent worth. Further, while nonhuman organisms may or may not be moral agents, Taylor (1986) argues that "all living organisms as well as certain groups of organisms" are moral subjects and that "moral subjects are entities that have a good of their own." In other words, "animals and plants are creatures whose lives can intentionally be made better or worse by our conduct" (Taylor 1986). Taylor’s (1986) biocentric position makes both conceptual and normative claims that we have duties and obligations to fulfill toward plants and animals because of their status as moral subjects. Taylor (1986) does not make a similar claim for inanimate objects, but does note that we have duties to behave in certain ways relative to such inanimate objects because of duties we must fulfill to the moral subjects affected by such inanimate objects. Thus we should refrain from polluting a river because this would harm the organisms that live in the river.

What are the rules and standards guiding the responsible conduct of field research?

We have selected a few “rules and standards” that may be helpful guides in creating an ethical program of field research. The first four are discussed specifically by Taylor (1986), and we have included his exact description of three of these.

Noninterference “Under this rule fall two sorts of negative duties, one requiring us to refrain from placing restrictions on the freedom of individual organisms, the other requiring a general ‘hands off’ policy with regard to whole ecosystems and biotic communities, as well as to individual organisms.” (Taylor 1986)

Fidelity “Under this rule fall the duties not to break a trust that a wild animal places in us (as shown by its behavior), not to deceive or mislead any animal capable of being deceived or misled, to uphold an animal’s expectations, which it has formed on the basis of one’s past actions with it, and to be true to one’s intentions as made known to an animal when it has come to rely on one.” (Taylor 1986)

Restitutive Justice “�that any agent which has caused an evil to some natural entity that is a proper moral subject owes a duty to bring about a countervailing good, either to the moral subject in question or to some other moral subject.” (Taylor 1986)

Nonmaleficence Failure to conduct field research in an ethical fashion can cause harm to human society, individual human beings, the natural environment, nonhuman species, and individual nonhuman organisms. To conduct field research in an ethical fashion is to avoid or minimize such harms, in keeping with the moral principle of nonmaleficence.

Respecting the Rights of Other Human Beings With specific reference to field work, our use of natural systems for research can infringe on the rights (or moral standing) of other individuals to use the same systems. For example, the presence of researchers in a natural area may disturb resident wildlife in such a way that makes the area less enjoyable for passive recreation (e.g., bird-watching) by non-researchers. Alteration of a natural system through a manipulation (such as the use of herbicides or removal of a particular species) might render that natural system unsuitable for use by other researchers. To the extent that conduct of field research may infringe on the rights of other human beings, these rights need to be taken into account when evaluating any proposed research project.

Respecting the Rights of Non-human Organisms While it is clear that human beings have rights (or moral standing), the case may be made that non-human organisms also have rights (e.g., Regan 2004). Various interpretations extend such rights only to sentient beings or to all living things. To the extent that conduct of field research may infringe on the rights of non-human organisms, these rights need to be taken into account when evaluating any proposed research project. Under this heading, we note that the “Gaia Hypothesis” of James Lovelock (1979) views the earth as a living system. If we subscribe to such a view, we will then afford the earth the same consideration as we would individual organisms.

Respecting the Integrity of Natural Systems In his famous essay on the “land ethic” in A Sand County Almanac (1949), Aldo Leopold clearly established a new paradigm for ethical behavior toward natural systems (A.C. Leopold 2004). This paradigm is well-represented by Aldo Leopold’s (1949) statement: “A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise.” Field researchers thus have an ethical responsibility toward the very natural systems they study.

Special Duties Special duties are in addition to other duties, such as non-discretionary and discretionary duties, and are often specified by codes of ethics developed by the various professions. For example, the Ecological Society of America (ESA) has developed a Code of Ethics for its members that includes the following: “Ecologists will conduct their research so as to avoid or minimize adverse environmental effects of their presence and activities, and in compliance with legal requirements for protection of researchers, human subjects, or research organisms and systems.” The ESA Code of Ethics states that researchers must “avoid or minimize” environmental effects, while complying with legal requirements. Implicit in this statement is the idea that researchers might be held to higher standards than ordinary citizens, who are expected only to comply with legal requirements. For example, researchers manipulating line-fishing in the Great Barrier Reef ecosystem were held to higher standards than ordinary citizens who were permitted to fish there legally (Marsh and Kenchington 2004).

Promoting the Welfare of the Profession Failure to conduct research in an ethical fashion may result in reduced respect by society for the conduct of field research. A profession that fails to regulate itself may come under increased scrutiny by society and the result may be lost opportunities, the result of restrictions on the conduct of field research, diminished public funding, and the like.

Students of ethics will find several of these rules to be quite familiar. For example, Shamoo and Resnik (2003) outline a similar set of rules that guide the responsible conduct of research. As anyone familiar with ecological research will quickly realize, the conduct of such research may be in conflict with some of these rules. How, then, are we to carry out field research while still being "good citizens" from the perspective of environmental ethics? We suggest that following a standard framework for evaluating and resolving ethical dilemmas will be helpful for those of us wishing to resolve the conflicting claims that may arise from the conduct of ecological research. Various normative ethical theories (e.g. utilitarianism) may also be brought to bear on such dilemmas.

Assessing the Responsible Conduct of Field Research

Several researchers have discovered that public guidelines for the ethical conduct of field research are difficult to find. For example, both Marsh and Eros (1999) and Marsh and Kenchington (2004) surveyed the instructions to authors and reviewers of scientific journals that routinely publish the results of field research. In the majority of cases, these journals offered no guidance with respect to the ethical conduct of research. When the journals addressed ethical issues, these were generally limited to use of human subjects or animal welfare. As noted above, Farnsworth and Rosovsky (1993) attribute the paucity of ethical guidelines for field researchers to several causes:

(1) trepidation about initiating a controversy that could endanger future research efforts;

(2) an assumption that the relative benefits of our research outweigh potential short-term costs to the study object (that is, increased knowledge of the study object may inform its conservation);

(3) difficulties in perceiving the potential negative impact of our work;

(4) tacit assumptions about certain experiments that are simply ‘wrong‘ to do.

It is our concern about the limitations of existing ethical guidelines for field researchers that prompted us to undertake this project. While we cannot address specific questions regarding the responsible conduct of field research in this essay, we can point to some guidelines that may be useful answering such questions. In particular, we recommend that all scientists contemplating field research begin by subjecting their proposed research to a thorough analysis using the following framework:

Summarize the ethical question(s).
Determine the facts of the case.
Identify the stakeholders (human and non-human).
Clarify the rights and obligations of each stakeholder.
Outline various courses of action. Identify & evaluate outcomes of each course of action.

Using such a framework, we can eventually evaluate the appropriateness of any proposed research program. We then advocate asking the following questions:

Is the proposed research legal? Field research on public lands (e.g., state parks, National Forests) may be subject to various regulations that require approvals/permits prior to the conduct of that research, and field researchers are expected to conform to these regulations. Work with rare, threatened, and endangered species is regulated by a variety of federal and state laws. For example, the Federal Endangered Species Act of 1973 (ESA) regulates activities affecting federally listed species of animals and plants. States also regulate activities affecting rare, threatened, and endangered species, and both federal and state regulations must be accounted for. For example, under the ESA, a landowner may destroy, damage, or remove federally protected plants on his or her property (Dale Suiter, pers. comm.), but the North Carolina Plant Protection and Conservation Act prohibits anyone from removing federally- or state-listed plants from private property without the landowner’s written permission and a state permit (Conservation Trust of North Carolina 1997).

Does the proposed research pass the "universalization test"? Ask yourself if you would be willing to have everyone act in the manner you have proposed. Proposed research that fails this test needs to be carefully scrutinized with regard to its justification on other grounds.

Is the proposed research valuable? All field research ultimately affects the natural systems upon which the research is conducted. Since the effects of research are likely to be negative, it is helpful to know the value of the proposed research. Although the value (or quality) of the research, as assessed by peer reviewers, cannot determine whether or not the research is ethical, knowing the value or quality of a proposed project can help us weigh the costs versus the benefits of conducting that research.

Do the benefits of the proposed research outweigh the costs? A utilitarian perspective may be useful in evaluating whether or not a proposed project should be conducted. According to this perspective, research that is of high quality and beneficial to society may be justified if its benefits outweigh its environmental costs. Again, this kind of test cannot, alone, determine whether or not the conduct of a particular project is ethical. For example, it is highly unlikely that scientists would ever condone field research that called for the complete annihilation of a species, regardless of the benefits of the research to society.

Does the proposed research conform to the special duties outlined in professional codes of ethics? We have already cited a portion of the Ecological Society of America’s Code of Ethics that addresses field research. Codes of ethics promulgated by professional societies (and scientific journals publishing the results of field research) can help in guiding the responsible conduct of field research.

Conclusions and Future Directions

We agree with Farnsworth and Rosovsky (1993) and Minteer & Collins (2005a, 2005b) that ethical considerations should be incorporated into the design of field research projects. We also agree with these authors that ongoing discussions between scientists and philosophers are necessary and can yield much valuable guidance for the responsible conduct of field research. In a review of the "reciprocal links" between scientists and philosophers, Rozzi (1999) reached a similar conclusion. We particularly like Rozzi’s (1999) concluding remarks and offer this extensive quotation:

Scientific theories and worldviews do not constitute purely cognitive structures; they provide guides for social and individual behavior. Metaphorically, they constitute scripts for people’s actions and life histories. Ecologists, by detaching themselves from the presumption of a type of objectivity associated with a non-historical/cultural conception of science, gain greater flexibility for building multiple and distinct theoretical and practical modes of relating to the natural world. Thus conceived, environmental ethics is not an external normative corpus within which ecological sciences should be clothed — not just another tool applied to 'solve' the current environmental crisis. Instead, the interrelations between ecological-evolutionary sciences and environmental ethics can be understood as a dynamically and intimately bonded unit: Ecologists construct their scientific theories influenced by particular ethical values, and ethicists value nature based on particular scientific theories. Under this unifying perspective, ecologists and eco-philosophers can overcome the schism between objective knowledge and subjective morality, recovering the link between theory and praxis, between the ways of knowing about nature and the ways of inhabiting the natural world.

In their concluding remarks, Marsh and Kenchington (2004) proposed the following initiatives directed toward establishing ethical standards for the conduct of field research, and we quote:

encourage your institutional animal ethics committee to broaden its terms of reference to include environmental ethics with any required increases in the expertise of its membership; encourage relevant scientific societies to develop an appropriate code of ethics to guide the environmental research conducted by their members; encourage relevant editorial boards of journals to require that the research they publish conform to an appropriate code of ethics; encourage management agencies that issue permits for field research to establish a Environmental Research Ethics Committee or similar arrangement to advise them on the ethics issues raised by specific research proposals.

We agree wholeheartedly with these recommendations, to which we would add one other: to require that all students in the natural sciences receive training in the ethical issues surrounding field research. Early exposure to the fundamentals associated with the responsible conduct of field research will result in a generation of field researchers equipped to address both the scientific and ethical dimensions of their work.

It is our hope that this LANGURE module will stimulate a dialogue that will eventually lead to formulation of a solid ethical foundation for the conduct of ecological research (and field research in general). Indeed, we may be exactly the "deliberative community" that Minteer and Collins (2005a) recommended as the agents "tasked with exploring and debating the ethical dimensions of ecological research and biological conservation practices." As stated earlier, we are limiting our focus (in the context of LANGURE) to the conduct of ecological research, but we hope that our contributions will be substantial nonetheless!

Complete one or more from the list below:

Create a code of ethics to guide you and your assistants in the field work portion of your dissertation work.

List all the areas in your dissertation field work that may have ethical implications, use the ethical framework outlined in the module to address each one.

Talk with your major professor or a member of your committee about ethical dilemmas in their field research and how they have dealt with them.

Literature Cited

Conservation Trust for North Carolina. 1997. Living with endangered species: a guide for North Carolina Property owners. 16 pp.

Ecological Society of America. Code of Ethics. http://www.esa.org/aboutesa/governance/codeofethics.php. Accessed October 11, 2004.

Farnsworth, E.J. and J. Rosovsky. 1993. The ethics of ecological field experimentation. Conservation Biology 7(3):463-472.

Leopold, A. 1949. A Sand County almanac. New York: Oxford University Press.

Leopold, A.C. 2004. Living with the land ethic. Bioscience 54(2):149-154.

Lovelock, J.E. 1979. Gaia: a new look at life on earth. Oxford: Oxford University Press. (original reference not seen)

Marsh, H., and C.M. Eros. 1999. Ethics of field research: do journals set the standard? Science and Engineering Ethics 5(3):375-382.

Marsh, H. and R. Kenchington. 2004. The role of ethics in experimental marine biology and ecology. Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology 300:5-14.

Regan, T. Research ethics: an introduction. Module I of the Research Ethics Mini Rounds produced by the Research Ethics Initiative, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC. http://www.fis.ncsu.edu/Grad/ethics/modules/ethical_frameworks.pdf. Accessed October 11, 2004.

Rozzi, R. 1999. The reciprocal links between evolutionary-ecological sciences and environmental ethics. Bioscience 49(11):911-921.

Shamoo, A.E. and D.B. Resnik. 2003. Responsible conduct of research. New York: Oxford University Press.