[IN-PERSON/LIVESTREAMED] Town Hall: Is it Time to Revisit the Belmont Report?

This plenary session will be held in-person, livestreamed for the Virtual Meeting, and recorded for on-demand access by attendees registered for PRIMR23 on this day.

This session will be presented over lunch. Attendees should get their boxed lunch before coming to the session room.

The Belmont Report, which articulates the ethical principles underlying the regulatory framework for research with human subjects in the United States, was promulgated nearly 50 years ago. Since then, the research and cultural landscape have changed significantly—from the proliferation of digital technologies and the vast quantities of data they produce, to the expansion of team and collaborative science; from evolving norms about personal privacy, social justice, and harms to communities, to the engagement of nontraditional actors, such as computer scientists, in human subjects research. While the Belmont principles are broad and flexible enough to continue to be relevant to much of the current research, research ethics scholars, oversight practitioners, and scientists have, in recent years, identified gaps in the foundations Belmont provides, along various dimensions—in terms of disciplines, technologies, participant populations, research entities, social norms, and research concepts that were not conceived at the time of the original Belmont Report.

PRIM&R is spearheading a multi-stakeholder effort to examine whether it is time to revisit and update the Belmont Report and identify what such an update might include. This Town Hall, led by members of PRIM&R’s Public Policy Committee, is an opportunity for the human subjects research ethics community to share with PRIM&R their perspectives on (a) if and how well the principles described in Belmont Report are still “working” for them; and (b) whether and in what ways Belmont should be updated to continue to provide a strong ethical framework contemporary research across varied disciplines. Discussion questions are below.

Even if you haven’t previously given thought to this topic, we encourage you to join the discussion. Everyone’s voice matters! If you cannot attend, but would like to contribute your perspective, send written comments to Sangy Panicker (if possible, please indicate which specific questions you are responding to).