Ethics in Qualitative Researches: a Concept Analysis using Rodger's Evolutionary Method

Recently, the tendency of health sciences researchers to conduct qualitative researches has increased. The nature of ethical issues in qualitative researches is subtle and different. The aim of this study is clarifying the concept of ethics in qualitative researches and more understanding about its attributes, antecedents and consequences. Rodger's evolutionary method of concept analysis was used in this study, and published related literature was retrieved regardless of their time limit. After selecting data sources, collection and analysis of data was carried out and information about the features, antecedents and consequences of concept as well as surrogate and related terms were summarized and encoded. After the concept analysis, ethics attributes in qualitative research were classified in two categories of common attributes with other types of research and special attributes of qualitative research. The antecedents were identified as the knowledge and skills of researcher, codes of ethics, and guidelines of ethics committee, research accuracy and informed consent. The consequences of qualitative research ethics included strength of research, increasing the integrity of the research process, reducing moral dilemmas during the research, reducing workload of the ethics committee, controlling the costs, and increasing the reliability and validity of qualitative research. Based on findings, we can offer the theoretical definition for the concept of ethics in qualitative research. The results of this study could clarify the concept of ethics in qualitative research and so, given theoretical concepts as building blocks of theories would help scientists to develop models and theories in this context.