Our discussion on the topic of research ethics have so far concentrated on the duties and obligations of the researcher. However, in many circumstances even researchers have been the victims of questionable practices by clients. Therefore, it is vital to discuss the ethical issues related to the treatment of researchers. Thus, AMA has addressed following two points relating to user’s obligations:
- The first of these obligations is that the user shall not knowingly disseminate conclusions that are inconsistent with or not warranted by the data. The distortion of results not only misleads the audience, but is potentially damaging to the researcher and the firm as well.
- It is unethical for users to solicit unique designs or concepts not commonly available and then to deliver it to another researcher for execution. Researchers rightly regard these techniques as being proprietary. Another possibility is that the client will utilize the information obtained from proposals and incorporate the researcher’s ideas into a project that will be carried out by his or her own staff.
Excessive Requests: The contract signed by both parties usually enumerates the obligations of the researcher to the client. However, the client often makes unreasonable demands on the researcher. Often clients making such excessive demands do not understand their implication.
Reneging on Promises Another problem that may arise that the client may have promised the researcher access to certain data such as sales, cost data etc. however, later the client may retract from supplying such data. This aspect makes it difficult for the researcher to complete the project as promised in the original agreement.
Availability of Funds There is an obligation to give bids for particular projects some idea of any budget constraints. Without such an idea as to the availability of the funds, the researcher may develop the proposal that may be out of the budget limits. Therefore the client must give researcher an idea of the amount of available funds so that the researcher may design the proposal accordingly.
