The ethical sensitivity of evaluators: A qualitative study using a vignette design
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Evaluation occurs in a context fraught with ethical issues. Evaluators are regularly faced with ethical tensions that are likely to influence the quality of their work. By developing an analytical model that categorizes evaluators along an altruistic-corporatist axis, we sought to understand which factors influence the ethical sensitivity of evaluators. To this end, utilizing a qualitative research design using vignettes, we exposed a dozen Canadian evaluators to ethically problematic situations to examine their ability to identify the ethical issues within the scenarios. The ensuing results allowed us to conclude that an evaluator’s ethical sensitivity is partially explained by the altruistic or corporatist nature of that evaluator; it also depends on other factors such as knowledge of the prescriptive norms in ethical matters, experience conducting evaluations, and the milieu and the working conditions within which the evaluators operate.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.056 | 0.105 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.003 | 0.003 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.017 | 0.015 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.006 | 0.005 |
| Open science | 0.003 | 0.006 |
| Research integrity | 0.003 | 0.004 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.002 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".