Division of General Medical Sciences, Washington University School of Medicine, 4523 Clayton Avenue, Campus Box 8005, St. Louis, MO, 63110, USA.
Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, Washington University, St. Louis, MO, USA.
Sci Eng Ethics. 2019 Oct;25(5):1499-1530. doi: 10.1007/s11948-018-0077-6. Epub 2019 Jan 2.
Researchers encounter challenges that require making complex professional decisions. Strategies such as seeking help and anticipating consequences support decision-making in these situations. Existing evidence on a measure of professional decision-making in research (the PDR) that assesses the use of decision-making strategies revealed that NIH-funded researchers born outside of the U.S. tended to score below their U.S. counterparts. To examine potential explanations for this association, this study recruited 101 researchers born in the United States and 102 born internationally to complete the PDR and measures of basic personal values, values in scientific work, discrimination between the seriousness of rules in research, exposure to unprofessional research practices, and acculturation to American culture. Several variables were associated with PDR scores-discrimination between types of rules in research, exposure to unprofessional research practices, acculturation, and the basic personal values of power, security, and benevolence. However, only security, benevolence, acculturation, and rule discrimination were also associated with nation of origin. In multivariate models, the variance explained by these variables in accounting for the association of nation of origin and PDR scores was somewhat overlapping, thus, only security and benevolence remained as unique, statistically significant predictors. Thus, this study identified some important variables in the association of nation of origin and PDR, but more research is needed. In a secondary analysis to examine the "clinical significance" (the practical importance) of scores on the PDR, this study examined aggregated PDR score data from the present sample and past samples of investigators. This analysis identified scores that may suggest a concern versus those scores that may be interpreted as excellent, proficient, or marginal. Implications for training and mentoring, along with considerations for future research are discussed.
研究人员在面临需要做出复杂专业决策的挑战时会遇到困难。在这种情况下，寻求帮助和预测后果等策略可以支持决策。现有的研究决策能力（PDR）评估研究中使用决策策略的专业衡量标准的证据表明，美国国立卫生研究院（NIH）资助的出生于美国境外的研究人员的得分往往低于美国同行。为了研究这种关联的潜在解释，本研究招募了 101 名出生于美国的研究人员和 102 名出生于国际的研究人员，让他们完成 PDR 以及基本个人价值观、科学工作价值观、对研究规则严重程度的区分、接触非专业研究实践和对美国文化的适应等方面的测量。几个变量与 PDR 得分相关——对研究规则类型的区分、接触非专业研究实践、适应以及权力、安全和仁慈等基本个人价值观。然而，只有安全、仁慈、适应和规则区分也与原籍国有关。在多元变量模型中，这些变量在解释原籍国与 PDR 得分之间的关联方面的差异有些重叠，因此，只有安全和仁慈仍然是唯一的、具有统计学意义的预测因素。因此，本研究确定了原籍国和 PDR 之间关联的一些重要变量，但需要进行更多的研究。在对 PDR 得分的“临床意义”（实际重要性）进行二次分析时，本研究检查了来自当前样本和过去调查员样本的 PDR 汇总得分数据。这项分析确定了可能表示关注的得分，以及可能被解释为优秀、熟练或边缘的得分。讨论了培训和指导的意义，以及对未来研究的考虑。
