Table 3 Criteria related to interdisciplinary research practice

Research drafting:

• What form of interdisciplinary collaboration serves the needs of an EE study? (e.g. how strong and how often should collaborators interact? Is it necessary to have face-to-face-meetings? Who has to be involved in which step of the research? Is there reflection on the potentials and the limitations of the kind of collaboration?) [18]

• How can the participating researchers be adequately selected? (e.g. Which disciplines/methods are actually needed?)

• How can an appropriate task schedule be developed? (e.g. at which point in time is empirical data to be gathered)

• Which agreements must be reached with regard to interdisciplinary communication? (e.g. consideration of terms used, explanation of professional jargon and development of a “common language”) [3]

• How can competencies and responsibilities be reasonably distributed within the research team? (e.g. despite their varying competencies, will all the interdisciplinary researchers remain actively involved in the research process? Who is accountable for what?)

• How can research questions be developed jointly? (e.g. regarding different interests and disciplinary perspectives, or regarding the goal of the study)

• How can the literature search be carried out? (e.g. having to acknowledge empirical-ethical studies from one’s own thematic field as well as to acknowledge both empirical and ethical work from different disciplines in diverse types of publication)

Data gathering:

• How is the joint development or modification of a research instrument carried out? (e.g. Is there a process that allows for dissent and argument in developing or modifying a research instrument?)

• Is there normative-ethical reflection on the empirical research process? (e.g. can implicit normativity be revealed that is related to a theoretical background (“social constructivism”)?)

• Is there a mutually critical appraisal by normative and empirical sciences with regard to data gathering? (e.g. what constitutes “good” data for the EE study) [54]

Data analysis and conclusions:

• How do normative and empirical aspects interrelate with regard to analysis and deliberation?

◦ Is the analysis of the empirical data influenced by normative theories, concepts, or standpoints? (e.g. by a specific account of patient autonomy)

• Is the normative deliberation influenced by the requirements of the empirical data analysis? (e.g. by standardization of data) [81]

• How do normative and empirical aspects interrelate with regard to the study’s conclusions?

◦ Are the ethical conclusions actually linked with normative premises? (e.g. avoiding an is/ought fallacy) [16, 23]

◦ Are the empirical conclusions supported by the data, or is there a bias in the empirical results based on the normative conclusions? (e.g. avoiding a normativist fallacy or “wishful thinking”, deducing broad conclusions from fine-grained data, under- or overrating of empirical data, ignoring of empirical evidence that would criticize normative conclusions etc.) [82, 83]

• Is there a critical evaluation of the results? (e.g. addressing methodological critique with regard to interdisciplinary cooperation, or indication of limitations)