Strengthening Ethics: A Faith Perspective on Educational Research

This article discusses ethical guidelines from the viewpoint of the teachings of Islam and, although not ostensibly different, finds parallels in the manner in which ethics could be conceptualised in the context of research in education. It seeks an alignment between ethics from the perspective of being a professional engaged in educational research with a personal significance based on one’s belief, which takes a holistic notion of life. The aims of being ethical researchers seem to be shared in many ways: protection, honesty and integrity. However, there is an added dimension of being accountable to God. The article first locates research within the wider context of Higher Education. Thereafter, to facilitate an understanding of ethics, as viewed from the framework of the Qur’ān, it proceeds to consider the ethical requirements of a university in the West Midlands, England, as a case study to examine the congruence, if any, with some of the ethical teachings of Islam. Based on the preliminary research, this article argues that Muslim researchers in education should be cognisant that their responsibilities are wider. Firstly, they are stewards meaning that the care and well-being of others comes first. Stewardship is both a Biblical and Qur’ānic concept meaning to be guardians. Secondly, by conducting their research in ethical ways, it will mean that they will be performing good deeds. These are meritorious actions rewarded by God. It also clarifies to supervisors and ethics review committees the key principles which might inform the thinking of some researchers from the Muslim community and how their motivations would be ethical

Admitting hospital patients: a qualitative study of an everyday nursing task

In recent years new modes of nursing work have been introduced globally in response to radical changes in healthcare policies, technology and new ideologies of citizenship. These transformations have redefined orthodox nurse–patient relationships and further complicated the division of labour within health-care. One distinctive feature of the work of registered nurses has been their initial assessment of patients being admitted to hospital, and it is of interest that this area of nursing practice remains central to the registered nurse's role at a time where other areas of practice have been relinquished to other occupational groups. This qualitative study, drawing on conversation analysis and ethnographic techniques, explores this area of everyday nursing work. Initial nursing assessments have attracted considerable interest in the nursing literature, where it is clearly stated that assessments should be patient centred and seen as the important first step on the road to a therapeutic nurse–patient relationship. Results from this study lead to the conclusion that the actual nursing practice of patient assessment on admission to hospital is at odds with the recommendations of the literature and that a more routinised, bureaucratic form of work is devised by nurses as a means of expediting the process of admission. In this paper I explore the work of nurses when initially assessing the health and social care needs of adults undergoing admission into hospital. While there has been a small body of work that has explored this particular area of nursing work, few have taken the opportunity offered by qualitative methods to explore in detail the way frontline nurses and patients accomplish initial assessments. The article aims to contribute to the understanding of everyday nursing work by describing the ways in which initial nursing assessments are rooted in social relations and routine practices. My premise in this article is that descriptions in nursing literature of mundane work such as patient assessment are often idealised towards what ‘should happen’ and biased to highlight the individual nurse's judgemental, interpretive work. Consequently, these descriptions often overlook how mundane nursing work may be shaped by external routines of everyday practice, which operate to organise the individual nurse's working day, rather than reflecting some idealised version of nursing practice. An attempt will be made to rectify this bias whilst acknowledging the fact that nurses’ work is not easily understood, nor is it easy to research (Melia 1979; Lawler 1991). In acknowledgement of this frequent reference will be made to qualitative data collected in the UK during doctoral studies to support any of the points made