Behind the text is an image of a Petri Dish

Research Ethics

The FST Research Ethics Committee (FSTREC) oversees ethical review of proposed research that is not reviewed through research ethics mechanisms outside the University, such as the NHS Research Ethics Service.

A new Research Ethics Application Management System (REAMS) launched on 1st of November 2021. New applications must be submitted via REAMS. Please see below for further details.

REAMS

Submitting an ethics application

A research project being conducted by FST staff and/or research students should be submitted to the FSTREC for ethical review if it involves human participants, or other possible ethical risk factors, and is not being reviewed externally.

Before submitting a new ethics application or an amendment to an existing ethics application for review please read the university's guidance. For additional help with research and ethical considerations during the pandemic, you may find this Guidance on ethical considerations document ‌useful.

Undergraduate and taught postgraduate coursework and dissertations that involve the generation of data with human participants need to be approved before any data is generated. As responsibility for ethics review of undergraduate and taught postgraduate projects lies within the Departments, applications for these research projects should not be submitted to FSTREC.

Faculty of Science & Technology Research Ethics information Accordion

Tab Content: Committee Membership

Chair: Professor John Towse

Deputy Chair: Dr Phillip Benachour

Psychology

School of Computing and Communications

Lancaster Environment Centre

Maths & Statistics

Physics

Lay members & Student representatives

  • Kate Wright (student representative)
  • TBC (lay member)

Tab Content: Committee Calendar

Applications for ethics review can be submitted at any time, so please do not wait until a committee deadline to submit your application. However, if your study poses significant ethical risks, it will be considered by the committee at its meetings, and the deadlines for paperwork for each meeting are given below.

Michaelmas meeting 1: 29th September 2022
Deadline for submissions: 12th September 2022

Michaelmas meeting 2: 8th December 2022
Deadline for submissions: 21st November 2022

Lent term meeting: 9th March 2023
Deadline for submissions: 20th February 2023

Summer term meeting: 22nd June 2023
Deadline for submissions: 5th June 2023

Tab Content: Guidance and Information

The following provides guidance on where to find further information about issues that may apply to your project, regardless of whether you are a staff member, research student or UG/PG, applicant. For queries relating to this guidance please contact the FST Research Ethics Officer.

Training and ethics frameworks

GDPR and Data management

Lancaster University Researcher safety policies and guidance

Research with Children

Social media

Transcription

Online transcription services

Please note that Lancaster University currently only has a data-sharing agreement with Nvivo and Microsoft (OneDrive and Teams) for transcription services. All other systems are not supported. A list of suggested software from ISS can be found here: Guidance from ISS on transcription software and technology

If you are using a transcriber external to your research team they will have to sign a Confidentiality agreement for the transcription of qualitative data. Please click on this link to find a template of this agreement.

Intellectual Property

For queries relating to Intellectual Property please e-mail the Intellectual Property Team (ext. 93298).

NHS Sponsorship

Research with Animals

If your work involves animals you will need authorisation from the Chief Administrative Officer and may need to submit an application to AWERB, please contact the secretary to AWERB, Lucy Sanderson for further details.