Lost in Translation.

I received comments from the CEP (the local ethics committee at Fiocruz) regarding my research project yesterday. They had a few comments and concerns about my project, specifically the pre-testing, and I have to re-submit a response to them addressing their concerns.

While some of the issues that were brought up were valid-- explaining more about the pre-testing techniques-- it was interesting to see the differences between what the IRB in the US looks at, and what the Brazilian CEP looks at. I found myself surprised at the number of questions that were posed about the methodology, which is something that is critical to the actual development of a solid science project, but not integral to the ethical components of an experiment, survey, etc. Many of the questions focused not so much on the ethics, but rather on whether we had prepared properly for the pre-test.

The biggest problem that I am now facing is gaining university clearance from each of the universities I will be surveying at. The CEP wants to know if the universities are OK with me surveying within their campuses.

It's a slow process, and it's not the most fun, but I hope that everything will get cleared away by the end of January.