[Web4lib] Re: academic libraries: oversight for usability tests

[Notess, Mark H]

Sounds like there are some over-active IRBs out there. Even if you are going
to write or talk about your results publicly, what you¹re doing by running
usability tests on a website is not typically "research" in the IRB sense
and so should not require their review at all. Of course IRBs have to be
very cautious, so if you ask them, they¹ll generally say it needs review.

Website development is just that: development. Talking with people and
showing them mockups or running websites is a normal part of institutional
development activities. It is not ³research² in the IRB sense. Does your
online student newspaper website go through the IRB every time they put up a
poll? Do they publish results? Research in the IRB sense is much narrower
than research as we throw the word around in common parlance.

Of course just because you don¹t go through the IRB doesn¹t mean you
shouldn¹t be ethical in your approach, avoiding harm to participants
(sorry<no scrolling banners!) or using data in ways that your participants
didn¹t expect or agree to.

If your IRB insists on sticking its nose in non-research, then they should
permit you to get approval with representative questions, where you specify
that part of your "research" protocol is to adjust the questions during the
research. If they can¹t handle those kinds of protocols, then they don¹t
have very broad experience.

Mark