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Abstract

Understanding the ethical principles that should guide research with child and adolescent participants is an essential task for researchers. Principles do not always yield final or uncontroversial answers, but they do serve to clarify and justify decisions, and their use makes individual decisions and research policies more public and open to examination. The principles of scientific importance, scientific soundness, respect for autonomy, beneficence, nonmaleficence, utility, and justice are described herein. The embodiment of these principles in the federal guidelines governing research is discussed, with attention to the differences between wronging and harming subjects and the meaning of informed consent.

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Ethical Principles Guiding Research on Child and Adolescent Subjects

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