One of the responsibilities of the Human Research Protection Office (HRPO) is to provide training, education, and outreach to members of the University community who engage in human subject research. The HRPO uses a multi-faceted approach to training, education, and outreach.
Aside from mandatory CITI training outlined below, HRPO offers various training sessions and educational seminars for faculty, staff, and students conducting research with human subjects. These training sessions and workshops are available upon request. Training and workshops are developed for the campus community based on demand and may be custom designed and tailored to meet the needs of a particular group.
CITI Training Requirements for Human Subjects Research
The University of Massachusetts-Amherst (UMass-Amherst) IRB requires faculty, staff, and students (graduates and undergraduates) who are conducting human subjects research, or are part of a research group that conducts human subjects research, to take the research-appropriate course on the CITI Home page. Researchers must complete their certification before submitting the Kuali protocol for initial approval, amendment, or renewal to be approved by the IRB.
Training is required of all personnel regardless of whether the study qualifies for exempt, expedited or full board review. You must receive a score of 80% or better overall to pass this course. If you receive less than 80% you will need to retake one or more of the quizzes to improve your score to 80% overall.
The Human Subjects CITI Online training is divided into two disciplinary categories:
- Group 1: Biomedical research Investigators and Key Personnel - Basic Course. This course is required for medical, physiological or pharmacological studies that includes, but is not limited to, research with drugs, devices or other interventions. (Researchers collaborating with Baystate should complete all modules to be certified for Baystate Collaborative Studies); or
- Group 2: Social, Behavioral, and Education Research Investigators and Key Personnel - Basic Course. This course is required for studies on sociological, psychological, anthropological or educational phenomena including observational and survey research and work with population and/or epidemiological studies.
- CITI Courses for these 2 two basic human subjects training modules can be found below under 'CITI Training Module Requirements.'
PLEASE NOTE: The Social and Behavioral Responsible Conduct of Research and the Biomedical Responsible Conduct of Research courses do NOT satisfy the human subjects training requirement.
See CITI Training FAQs on the Human Subjects FAQ page.
Refresher Training
All human subjects researchers at UMass are required to complete a CITI Training refresher every 5 years. If CITI training is expired (over 5 years) IRB submissions such as new studies, revisions, or renewals will not be processed until the CITI refresher has been completed.