Improving the Human Experience

I have been well instructed in research ethics through my college experiences for the past couple of years. Research must demonstrate a realizable, prospective benefit to the world in some way. Otherwise, the research is unwarranted. This is especially true when the research involves experiments with human and animal subjects. Basically, research, in any area, is about improving the human experience, not knowledge for knowledge's sake. Reciprocity, then, is really just achieving that end at the site and time of the research. I learned about reciprocity actually just two months ago in another class I was taking this summer - Medical Ethnobotany, with Professor Thomas Carlson. Professor Carlson talked about research agreements such as reciprocity and the return of research results to the host country, not just obtaining prior informed consent, which up until then I assumed all research agreement meant. Professor Carlson gave examples of reciprocity where he asks the local community what they need, prior to any research being conducted. Sometimes it meant a clean-water system, and at other times it meant school supplies. This is similar to Ellen Cushman allowing members of the community she was studying access to her university's computers. It may not mean too much to Cushman, but it could be important to those community members. So reciprocity can definitely exist in research. At times it is difficult to make the connection between the highbrow research conducted within the hallowed halls of a university setting, and the everyday people waiting for a cure or hoping for change. But the connection is there, and we all, especially the researchers, need to keep this in mind as we do our best to improve the human experience.