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Ethical Approval for Research

All research is subject to ethical scrutiny. However, only research involving human participants or their data or research involving animals requires ethical approval.

Before you start your research confirm that you need ethical approval for your research - see the checklist below

Get familiar with:

Trinity’s Policy on Good Research Practice
Data Protection at Trinity:
- Trinity’s Data Protection Policy and Handbook. Official Trinity templates for the required consent forms and PILs can be found here.
- GDPR training is provided by the Data Protection Office for all those processing or conducting or supervising research involving Personal Data of Participants
Research Integrity at Trinity:
- PhD candidates are automatically enrolled in the Blackboard CA7000 Research Integrity module
- All other staff and students should avail of the Epigeum Research Integrity training
Any other requirements specific to your faculty, school or discipline.

Ensure the following are in place:

Enough time: depending on the nature of the research, applications can take a long time to complete
Complete Trinity’s training modules for Data Protection and Integrity in Research
Permissions to contact participants are in place, recruitment materials and consent forms are prepared
Garda Vetting completed if required
Data Collection instruments developed
Interventions or experiments designed
Confirmation whether your research qualifies as Health Research
If you are using non-Trinity sites or collaborating with researchers from another institution you may also need:

Ethics approvals from committees outside of Trinity where necessary
Licences or permits to access non-Trinity sites and/or secondary data sources
Data Protection Risk or Impact Assessments (DPR/I As) for non-Trinity sites
Data sharing contracts

Prepare any relevant documents pertaining to the above as they will be required as attachments for the Application.

Making an Ethical Application: made easier with the Research Ethics Application Management System (REAMS)

The Research Ethics Application Management system (REAMs) is a new platform developed for processing research ethics applications.

In REAMs V2 the Data Protection review process is decoupled from REAMs and will happen outside of REAMs. Your REAMs application cannot proceed to the relevant REC until this Data Protection review process has occurred.

There are 6 questions within REAMs that may trigger a Data Protection Review. The Data Protection Office (DPO) have provided information on this review process here.

Once you have completed your Data Protection review, the DPO will provide you with ‘DPO-letter of completion’ which you must upload as part of your REAMs application.

NB. Your application CANNOT be submitted until you upload your letter of completion from the DPO

Help text boxes pop up as you go through the application providing links to more information in a comprehensive manual which is navigable by contents headings or key words to help you complete your application

Click here to access the Research Ethics Application Management System