I have several ideas for research that I believe would advance our understanding of psychological priming. It won't involve anything extreme - just reading non-offensive words on a screen.
But I have only a bachelor's degree. Will that preclude me in anyway from doing research of this type, and publishing?
I know I'll have a greater challenge finding participants, and designing the experiment, and correctly formatting my paper without guidance, etc. I can work with that.
But is it even possible to get IRB approval without being affiliated with a university?
Is there any way that my current affiliation status will formally prevent me from going forward?
Answer
It is possible to get IRB reviews without an academic affiliation. Commercial IRBs (companies that, for a fee, review trials for third parties) exist; that's one way that industry manages to perform clinical trials.
Commercial IRBs have multiplied in recent decades, reviewing and passing proposals for profit. Their creation was spurred partly by an explosion of industry-sponsored clinical trials, but they are increasingly passed business from academic centres, to relieve overstretched in-house ethics committees. There are now dozens of these companies and they will see potential business in the proposed shift to single-IRB oversight of multi-site trials.
--Who watches the watchmen? Nature, 2011
Some of these IRBs are listed at the Consortium of Independent Review Boards (CIRB).
The absence of a graduate degree and of academic affiliation don't prevent you from publishing either, although they may present some complications during the process. There are other questions in Academia SE that discuss this:
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