Ethics Committee Faculty of Humanities
Before any research involving participants, such as questionnaires, interviews, experiments or observations, or research involving personal data commences, approval of the Ethics Committee must be obtained.
Upholding ethical standards during research and obtaining ethics approval where necessary is an integral part of complying with the Netherlands Code of Conduct for Research Integrity, see 3.2 (13) and 4.6 (18) of the 2018 version. A growing number of academic journals as well as Dutch and European funding bodies require the formal approval of an Ethics Committee before an article can be published or a subsidy granted.
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Applying for ethics review
Anybody with an UvAnetID can apply for approval.
Go to the Faculty of Humanities' Research Management Services (RMS) Portal, login with your UvAnetID and create a new project. To gain access to the RMS-portal, you need to have activated the 2-factor-authentication using the Tiqr app for your UvAnetID.
Fill out both the Ethics Review (reviewed by the Ethics Committee) and the Privacy Protection Review (reviewed by a data steward) and submit these alongside the information brochure and informed consent form, ensuring they have been customised to fit your project.
Please note that your project will only be considered approved by the committee once you have received an official letter of approval.Download the RMS Manual for Researchers (PDF)
Ethics applications submitted before 2023 are archived and can still be accessed by the applicants via the Ethics Data Management Review Portal. -
Student Research
For detailed information about the ethics review process for students, please visit the Ethics in research page.
Student research projects — whether part of a course or a BA/MA thesis — that involve participants and/or personal data require ethics approval. Students may assist their supervisor with preparing the application as a collaborator in the RMS portal. However, the responsible supervisor, not the student, should check and submit the application.
Different types of student research are eligible for different types of procedures:
- Standard BA/MA thesis research → Fast Track procedure
- Non-standard BA/MA thesis research → Regular procedure
- Education-based research → Regular procedure and in case of multiple projects within a single course through an umbrella application.
Applicants of thesis projects can expect a first response within one week of submission. However, the time required for final approval cannot be guaranteed, as it depends on factors such as the complexity and sensitivity of the project, the completeness of the application, and the applicant’s responsiveness.
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Guidelines and procedures
Download guidelines / procedures below. The guidelines will be kept up to date and may change as the situation changes. Be sure to check for the latest version!
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Standard forms for information and consent
The Standard EC form contains templates for an information brochure and a consent form. Usually, both need to be adjusted and uploaded during the Ethics Review procedure in RMS. They can be uploaded in one document. Following the general version of the standard forms, there are templates specifically for parents giving consent for their child and templates for parents giving consent for their child via a school.
The Combined standard form contains a concise version of the information brochure and consent form suitable for anonymous online surveys and similar studies.
The Standard EC form for data collection notice in case of public interest contains a template which can be used for a data collection notice for research under the legal basis public interest. In case the legal basis for the data processing is public interest (and not consent), the participants or data subjects are informed via a data collection notice which is either sent to them directly or posted on a public website. The adjusted data collection notice needs to be uploaded during the Ethics Review process for projects making use of public interest. This for example often applies when personal data is collected from a large amount of people through (social) media.
How to use the standard forms?
- Replace, remove or change the colour to black of all blue text parts
- For [name department / capacity group / research school] choose one option
- Delete green parts if not applicable. If they are applicable, change their colour to black
- Adjust descriptions to your own project
- Adjust level of information and language to your research participants
The Addendum privacy rights is an attachment to the information brochure and contains details about the rights participants/data subjects have under the GDPR (EU privacy law). The addendum can be provided to participants and data subjects in addition to the information brochure. The researcher can choose to include the addendum or provide it on demand to participants.
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Review procedure for standard research
Standard projects will be assigned to one member of the Ethics Committee and are evaluated throughout the year as they come in. Note that, during holiday periods, the review procedure can take longer due to limited staff availability.
Important note: the standard definition has been updated. The new definition is in place as of 27 of January 2024.
A project is considered standard if all of the following criteria apply:
- participants are 16 years or older;
- participants are legally competent;
- participants do not belong to a vulnerable group;
- there is no risk of chance findings;
- there is no deception;
- there is no possibility of discomfort;
- there is no possibility of harmful or disadvantageous effects.
Exception for all linguistic research
Linguistic research, which frequently includes minors (a vulnerable group), is regarded as standard if all other standard features listed above apply.
Research with personal data from social media
Media studies research processing personal data from social media is considered standard if all of the following criteria apply:
- participants younger than 16 years are not intentionally targeted;
- legally incompetent participants are not intentionally targeted;
- participants who belong to a vulnerable group are not intentionally targeted;
- there is no high chance of processing sensitive information;
- participants are not mislead;
- the data collection methods do not intend to go against people’s wishes;
- there is no possibility of harmful or disadvantageous effects.
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Review procedure for non-standard research
Non-standard projects are discussed in one of the plenary meetings of the Ethics Committee and need to be submitted according to the deadlines below.
The Ethics Committee will convene on:
- 6 June 2025 (deadline for non-standard projects 30 May 2025)
- 3 October 2025 (deadline to submit non-standard projects: 25 September)
- 28 November 2025 (deadline to submit non-standard projects: 20 November)
- 23 January 2026 (deadline to submit non-standard projects: 15 January)
- 13 March 2026 (deadline to submit non-standard projects: 5 March)
- 22 April 2026 (deadline to submit non-standard projects: 14 April)
- 5 June 2026 (deadline to submit non-standard projects: 28 May)
Committee members
The Ethics Committee consists of a chairperson, a professor of Ethics from the Philosophy Department and various members with specific areas of expertise covering all involved disciplines. The committee secretary is provided by the Faculty Office’s Research Department.
Contact
Ethics Committee secretary - commissie-ethiek-fgw@uva.nl | Binnengasthuisstraat 9 | 1012 ZA Amsterdam | kamer 2.03