The DOI matches its Crossref record; 27 of the 27 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Empty ethics: the problem with informed consent
Open accessAbstract
Abstract Informed consent is increasingly heralded as an ethical panacea, a tool to counter autocratic and paternalistic medical practices. Debate about the implementation of informed consent is constricted and polarised, centring on the right of individuals to be fully informed and to freely choose versus an autocratic, paternalistic practice that negates individual choice. A bioethical framework, based on a principle‐led form of reductive/deductive reasoning, dominates the current model of informed consent. Such a model tends to abstract the process of consent from its clinical and social setting. By fleshing out the social process involved when patients and healthy volunteer subjects consent to take part in clinical drug trials, this paper attempts to address the problem arising from the current ‘empty ethics’ model. My arguments are substantiated by qualitative interview data drawn from a study I conducted on the process of consent as experienced by participants in clinical drug trials.
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“Particularly when patients are facing dire situations, we cannot simply assume that an elicited choice will be actively and freely made based on careful consideration and adequate understanding of the information (27).”
From Lessons from HeLa Cells: The Ethics and Policy of Biospecimens (2016) · cites this paper as [27]
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“Moreover, whilst its generalizability to social research may be questioned, evidence from the medical literature of poor recall and comprehension of consent information may caution us against over-reliance on some aspects of the consent process (Corrigan 2003; Dawson 2009).”
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Metadata
- Authors
- Corrigan, O.
- Affiliations
- University of Cambridge (GB)
- Corresponding author
- Corrigan, Oonagh
- ORCID
- Corrigan, Oonagh
- Venue
- Sociology of Health & Illness
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2003-11
- Volume
- 25
- Issue
- 7
- Pages
- 768-792
- ISSN
- 0141-9889 (ISSN-L)
- 1467-9566
- OpenAlex
- W2061123320
- Cited by
- 436
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2026: 14 · 2025: 9 · 2024: 17 · 2023: 10 · 2022: 15 · 2021: 35 · 2020: 12 · 2019: 16 · 2018: 21 · 2017: 30 · 2016: 25 · 2015: 14 · 2014: 22 · 2013: 31 · 2012: 21
- FWCI
- 15.56
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Locations
- Sociology of Health & Illness (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- DigitalGeorgetown (Georgetown University Library) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institutes of Health
- Topics
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health › Ethics in Clinical Research
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health › Ethics and bioethics in healthcare
- Social Sciences › Law › Medical and Health Sciences Research
- Keywords
- informed consent, clinical drug trials, patient consent, paternalism, individual choice, bioethical principles, healthy volunteers, clinical ethics
- MeSH terms
- Attitude of Health Personnel, Choice Behavior, Clinical Trials as Topic, Decision Making, Female, United Kingdom, Humans, Informed Consent, Interviews as Topic, Male, Surveys and Questionnaires, Social Perception, Drugs, Investigational, Randomized Controlled Trials as Topic, Personal Autonomy, Bioethical Issues, Ethics, Clinical, Paternalism, Principle-Based Ethics, Ethics, Research, Narration, Biomedical Research
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