What (and Where) Is the Ethical Code Concerning Researcher Conflict of Interest?

The author urges psychology's professional associations to provide ethical guidelines that identify relationships that can create conflicts of interest and offer reasoned advice on managing them.

Abstract

Decision makers are expected to identify and perhaps recuse themselves from actions that affect entities (such as relatives or corporations) to which their relationships create an appearance of conflict of interest. This article illustrates relationships that can create conflicts of interest for editors, grant decision makers, journal and grant reviewers, expert witnesses, and also for many researchers with method or theory commitments. The author urges psychology's professional associations to do what they now do either minimally or not at all: provide ethical guidelines that identify these conflicts and offer reasoned advice on managing them.