“It's Just Another Piece of Schoolwork”: the ethics of questionnaire research on pupils in schools

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Abstract
During 1988‐90 nearly 2000 school pupils in Leicestershire took part in the ‘Drugs in Schools; a programme of inquiry’ (DISPRIN) project and the ‘Drugs and Risk‐Taking’ (DART) research project. As part of the research these 13‐ to 16‐year‐olds completed a questionnaire on their use of alcohol, tobacco and other drugs. This article presents data on the pupils' perceptions of doing the questionnaire and discusses the ethical issues raised for researchers in schools. The research revealed that, whilst a minority of respondents were suspicious of the exercise, for the most part it was “just another piece of schoolwork”. To the extent that completing research questionnaires is perceived as schoolwork, we need to question the extent to which such questionnaires are in fact completed voluntarily and with the willing cooperation of pupils. This, in turn, poses interesting ethical questions for researchers, teachers and educational authorities.