Institute of History, Ethics and Philosophy of Medicine, Hannover Medical School, Hannover, Germany.
Institute of Ethics and History of Medicine, University Medicine Greifswald, Greifswald, Germany.
PLoS One. 2019 Jul 29;14(7):e0220438. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0220438. eCollection 2019.
Value and waste in preclinical and clinical research projects are intensively debated in biomedicine at present. Such different aspects as the need for setting objectives and priorities, improving study design, quality of reporting, and problematic incentives of the academic reward system are addressed. While this debate is also fueled by ethical considerations and thus informed by bioethical research, up to now, the field of bioethics lacks a similar extensive debate. Nonetheless, bioethical research should not go unquestioned regarding its scientific or social value. What exactly constitutes the value of bioethical research, however, remains widely unclear so far.
This explorative study investigated possible value dimensions for bioethical research by conducting a qualitative literature analysis of researchers' statements about the value of their studies. 40 bioethics articles published 2015 in four relevant journals (The American Journal of Bioethics, Bioethics, BMC Medical Ethics and Journal of Medical Ethics) were analyzed. The value dimensions of "advancing knowledge" (e.g. research results that are relevant for science itself and for further research) and "application" (e.g. increasing applicability of research results in practice) were used as main deductive categories for the analysis. Further subcategories were inductively generated.
The analysis resulted in 62 subcategories representing a wide range of value dimensions for bioethical research. Of these, 45 were subcategories of "advancing knowledge" and 17 of "application". In 21 articles, no value dimensions related to "application" was found; the remaining 19 articles mentioned "advancing knowledge" as well as "application". The value dimensions related to "advancing knowledge" were, in general, more fine-grained.
Even though limitations arise regarding the sample, the study revealed a plethora of value dimensions that can inform further debates about what makes bioethical research valuable for science and society. Besides theoretical reflections on the value of bioethics more meta-research in bioethics is needed.
目前，生物医学领域正在深入讨论临床前和临床研究项目中的价值和浪费问题。这些问题涉及到设定目标和优先事项、改进研究设计、报告质量以及学术奖励系统的激励问题等不同方面。虽然这场辩论也受到伦理考虑的推动，因此受到生物伦理研究的影响，但到目前为止，生物伦理学领域缺乏类似的广泛辩论。尽管如此，生物伦理学研究不应在其科学或社会价值方面不受质疑。然而，到目前为止，生物伦理学研究的价值究竟是什么，还远未达成共识。
本探索性研究通过对研究人员关于其研究价值的陈述进行定性文献分析，调查了生物伦理学研究的可能价值维度。分析了 2015 年在四个相关期刊（《美国生物伦理学杂志》、《生物伦理学》、《BMC 医学伦理学》和《医学伦理学杂志》）上发表的 40 篇生物伦理学文章。“推进知识”（例如，研究结果对科学本身和进一步研究具有重要意义）和“应用”（例如，提高研究结果在实践中的适用性）的价值维度被用作分析的主要演绎类别。进一步的子类别是通过归纳生成的。
分析产生了 62 个子类别，代表了生物伦理学研究的广泛价值维度。其中，45 个子类别属于“推进知识”，17 个子类别属于“应用”。在 21 篇文章中，没有发现与“应用”相关的价值维度；其余 19 篇文章既提到了“推进知识”，也提到了“应用”。与“推进知识”相关的价值维度通常更为细致。
尽管样本存在局限性，但该研究揭示了大量的价值维度，可以为进一步讨论生物伦理学研究对科学和社会的价值提供信息。除了对生物伦理学价值的理论思考，还需要更多的元研究。
