Ethical Research Involving Children

ETHICAL RESEARCH INVOLVING CHILDREN

Pedagogical Perspective (PedPer)

ISSN: 2822-4841 | DOI Prefix: 10.29329

Quick Summary

Pedagogical Perspective (PedPer) (eISSN: 2822-4841) is a signatory to the Ethical Research Involving Children (ERIC) initiative and is committed to promoting ethically sound research involving children. As an education journal, PedPer publishes a significant proportion of research involving participants under the age of 18. This page outlines PedPer’s expectations and requirements for the ethical conduct, reporting, and review of such research.

1) ERIC Signatory Commitment

PedPer is a signatory to the Ethical Research Involving Children (ERIC) Charter, an international initiative that provides guidance on ethically responsible research with children and young people. By signing the ERIC Charter, PedPer commits to upholding the following seven core principles in all research involving children published in the journal:

1. Ethics — Research involving children must be designed, reviewed, and conducted to ensure integrity, quality, and ethical standards.
2. Harms and benefits — Researchers must assess and minimise potential harms and maximise benefits to child participants.
3. Informed consent — Children and their parents/guardians must be provided with sufficient information to make informed decisions about participation.
4. Privacy and confidentiality — The privacy, anonymity, and confidentiality of child participants must be protected at all stages of the research and publication process.
5. Payment and compensation — Any payment or compensation offered to child participants must be ethical, appropriate, and not constitute undue inducement.
6. Involvement of children — Children should be meaningfully involved in research processes where appropriate, and their views and experiences should be respected.
7. Governance — Research involving children must be subject to independent ethical review and oversight by a recognised ethics committee or institutional review board.

For full details on the ERIC framework, see: childethics.com

2) International Ethical Standards

PedPer’s requirements for research involving children are grounded in the following international frameworks:

ERIC (Ethical Research Involving Children) — PedPer signatory
UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) — the international standard for children’s rights, including the right to protection, participation, and privacy
Declaration of Helsinki — ethical principles for medical and human subjects research, including research with vulnerable populations
COPE (Committee on Publication Ethics) — publication ethics guidelines applicable to all research involving human participants
National and institutional ethics regulations applicable in the country/countries where the research was conducted

3) Requirements for Authors

Submissions that include participants under the age of 18 must demonstrate compliance with the following requirements:

Ethics approval

The study must have received approval from a recognised ethics committee or institutional review board (IRB) before data collection began.
The ethics approval reference number, the name of the approving body, and the date of approval must be stated in the manuscript (in the Declarations/Ethics Approval section and on the Title Page).
If the research is exempt from formal ethics review under applicable regulations, the author(s) must provide a clear explanation and justification.

Informed consent and assent

Parental/guardian consent: Written informed consent must be obtained from the parent(s) or legal guardian(s) of all child participants prior to their involvement in the study.
Child assent: Age-appropriate assent must be obtained from child participants themselves, where the child is capable of understanding the nature and purpose of the research. The assent process should be described in the manuscript.
Right to withdraw: Children and their parents/guardians must be informed of their right to withdraw from the research at any time without penalty or consequence.

Privacy, confidentiality, and anonymisation

All identifying information (names, school names, photographs, location details) must be removed or pseudonymised in the manuscript.
Data handling and storage procedures must protect the privacy and confidentiality of child participants.
If the research involves visual data (photographs, video recordings), explicit consent for their use in publication must be obtained and documented.

Minimising harm

Researchers must describe the measures taken to minimise any physical, psychological, social, or emotional harm to child participants.
Particular care must be taken with vulnerable children (e.g., children with disabilities, children in institutional care, refugee or displaced children).

Reporting in the manuscript

The manuscript must include:

Ethics approval details (committee name, reference number, date);
Description of the informed consent and assent process;
Description of privacy and anonymisation measures;
Description of any measures to minimise harm;
Any limitations or ethical considerations specific to the study.

4) Editorial Screening and Review

During the initial editorial screening, the Editor-in-Chief (or designated editor) verifies that all submissions involving child participants include the required ethical documentation. Specifically:

Manuscripts lacking a clear ethics approval statement will be returned to the authors for completion before peer review;
Manuscripts that raise ethical concerns (e.g., inadequate consent procedures, potential for harm, re-identification risk) may be referred for additional editorial review;
Reviewers are asked to assess ethical compliance as part of the peer review evaluation criteria;
The editorial office may request additional documentation (e.g., copies of ethics approval letters, consent forms) at any stage of the review process.

5) Research in Educational Settings

A significant proportion of educational research takes place in schools, classrooms, and other settings where children are present. PedPer recognises that:

Routine educational assessments, programme evaluations, and quality improvement activities may be subject to different ethical review requirements depending on the jurisdiction;
Authors must clarify whether their study constitutes research (requiring ethics approval) or routine educational evaluation (which may be exempt), and provide documentation accordingly;
Even where formal ethics approval is not required, authors are expected to demonstrate that the principles of informed consent, confidentiality, and harm minimisation were respected.

6) Non-Compliance and Consequences

If ethical non-compliance is identified — whether before or after publication — PedPer will handle the matter in accordance with COPE guidelines and the journal’s Handling Allegations of Misconduct Policy. Possible actions include:

Return of the manuscript for ethical clarification or additional documentation;
Rejection of the manuscript if ethical requirements cannot be met;
Post-publication correction, Expression of Concern, or retraction if ethical non-compliance is confirmed after publication (see Corrections, Retractions & Expressions of Concern Policy);
Notification to the authors’ institution(s) and/or the relevant ethics committee.

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