On informing jurors of potential sanctions.

Two experiments tested (a) whether jurors make assumptions about the potential punishment that would follow from a guilty verdict, (b) whether those assumptions influence jurors' implicit threshold for reasonable doubt, and (c) whether informing jurors of the potential punishment additionally influences their implicit threshold. Experiment 1 manipulated the alleged crime (grand theft vs. manslaughter) holding all other factors constant, and found that mock jurors (n = 102, recruited via Amazon Mechanical Turk) had different expectations about the relative punishments but that these expectations did not affect their implicit threshold for reasonable doubt.

Linguistic and Cultural Challenges in Communication and Translation in US-Sponsored HIV Prevention Research in Emerging Economies.

Linguistic and cultural differences can impede comprehension among potential research participants during the informed consent process, but how researchers and IRBs respond to these challenges in practice is unclear. We conducted in-depth interviews with 15 researchers, research ethics committee (REC) chairs and members from 8 different countries with emerging economies, involved in HIV-related research sponsored by HIV Prevention Trials Network (HPTN), regarding the ethical and regulatory challenges they face in this regard. In the interviews, problems with translating study materials often arose as major concerns.

Detecting, preventing, and responding to "fraudsters" in internet research: ethics and tradeoffs.

Internet-based health research is increasing, and often offers financial incentives but fraudulent behavior by participants can result. Specifically, eligible or ineligible individuals may enter the study multiple times and receive undeserved financial compensation. We review past experiences and approaches to this problem and propose several new strategies.