AIEC, consent statements and malpractice

These are three distinct tiers, and manuscripts will sometimes conflate them. Ethics advice is informal guidance. Ethics clearance is a documented check against an established framework, currently offered by the African Independent Ethics Committee (AIEC). Ethics approval is formal authorisation from an accredited body, such as a university or national research council. AIEC currently offers ethics advice and ethics clearance, not full ethics approval. When a manuscript states it received AIEC clearance, this is acceptable evidence of ethics engagement, but it is not equivalent to institutional ethics approval, and should not be described as such.

Under the AJSW author guidelines, authors must show at least one of three forms of ethics guidance: ethics clearance or approval, ethics training, or a detailed personal ethics reflection describing the ethics the author uses in their own family or community and how these were applied in the study. As a reviewer, check that at least one of these is genuinely present, not simply asserted.

Assessing consent and approval statements

A credible consent and approval statement is specific to the study, not a general description copied from a textbook. Look for the following.

• Research approval from the actual site of the research, for example village heads, community elders, district or organisational authorities, named specifically
• Consent that is clear about what participants agreed to, obtained in a language participants actually understand, with translation mechanisms described where needed
• Evidence the ethics statement reflects what was actually done, not a general description of what ethics usually requires
• Where children, vulnerable groups, or communities with limited literacy are involved, as is common in SINCCD submissions, a description of how consent was made meaningful rather than a formality

Recognising and responding to malpractice

Malpractice includes any of the following, and reviewers are one of the main lines of defence against it.

• Absence of informed consent and permission from the people, communities and leaders involved
• Data or research fraud, including manipulation of data or reporting research that was not done
• Adding people as co-authors who did not contribute significantly, or excluding those who did
• Plagiarism
• Simultaneous submission to more than one publication
• Undisclosed conflict of interest
• Reviewer bias
• Harm caused to participants or communities
• Breach of confidentiality or anonymity where this was promised
• Improper influence over the research process that breaks research ethics

If you suspect malpractice, raise it with the editor rather than the author. Mtandao’s response to confirmed malpractice can include communication with the authors, clarification, correction, retraction, apology, or informing the funder, institution, participants or another journal or ethics board, depending on severity.