Royal Holloway requires all staff and students who are engaged in research to maintain the highest standards of ethics and integrity whilst conducting their research.
What is Research Ethics?
Research ethics can be defined as the moral and philosophical principles that govern how researchers and innovators should carry out their work, throughout the research and innovation lifecycle.
Research ethics takes into consideration the impacts and potential harms on:
- research participants
- research and innovation teams
- broader society, the environment and animals
Research Ethics at Royal Holloway
Royal Holloway is committed to protecting the dignity, rights, and welfare of all those involved in research and to promoting the highest ethical standards of research in accordance with the appropriate ethical, legal and professional frameworks, obligations and standards.
Royal Holloway is committed to the core principles of the Concordat to Support Research Integrity (2025): honesty, care and respect, rigour, transparency and open communication and accountability.
Our research ethics policy outlines the principles and procedures that underpin the promotion and maintenance of an ethical culture throughout the university. Our policy also reflects the principles outlined in the Concordat to Support Research Integrity (2025) and upholds our commitments as a signatory of this concordat. This research ethics policy is currently under review and an updated policy will be available by the end of 2025.
In order to characterise the level of risk of a research project and enable support consistent reviews, we implemented the use of the institutions research ethics risk review framework .
We manage a timely and efficient ethical review process that is proportionate to the level of risk of harm or adverse effects identified in the project. This process exists to ensure that our activities continue to fulfil ethical standards as well as legal obligations and safety standards
The university Research Ethics Committee (REC) that is responsible for overseeing all research ethics matters concerning research conducted by Royal Holloway’s researchers. REC also promotes a culture of good ethical practice and is responsible for ensuring compliance with the University research ethics policy and processes.
We have an experienced research ethics team based in the Research and Innovation Directorate who provide ethical guidance, support and training to staff and students; and support the operation of the ethics review system and process.
Our doctoral school provide training on research ethics to doctoral students through the researcher development programme.
Useful links
Training and guidance
The Research and Innovation research ethics team provide training to:
- all new staff through the ‘Research at RHUL’ training days, which are held twice a year.
- all reviewers of research ethics applications, this training covers concepts in the risk review framework and how to manage the system.
In addition, as part of our researcher development programme, we offer a training module on research ethics to all our doctoral students.
This course can be accessed here Epigeum Research Ethics Module (for RHUL staff and students only)
Contact us
For general enquiries please contact ethics@rhul.ac.uk
For Royal Holloway staff and students, to find out more about research ethics at Royal Holloway, go here
