Towards a psychotherapy publishing ethics concordat

Abstract

The changing landscape of data management and privacy have far-reaching implications for psychotherapy research regarding confidentiality, informed consent, and data de-identification in scientific publications. This paper reports on discussions among international psychotherapy journal editors regarding ethical guidelines governing publishing qualitative case study research. A range of psychotherapy journals have been examined and it notable that there is a variegated approach to consent and data-identification, and there are contested ethical standpoints when it comes to publishing research. These contestations are presented and six key areas for debate are set out, i) explicit informed consent, ii) prospective and retrospective consent, iii) data de-identification and bricolage, iv) withdrawing consent, v) education and training, and vi) inconsentable circumstances. These are set out as base for further discussion towards the development of a Psychotherapy Publishing Ethics Concordat (PEC).