摘要：Background: Know the conception of ethics in research of the researches and members of the ethics in research committees – CEP (secretaries, presidents/coordinators and advisors); identify the significance attributed to the CEP by researchers and members of the CEP; identify the reasons that bring the researchers to submit their projects to the CEP. Methods: Quantitative and descriptive survey approved by the CEP/UESB and performed with 95 people. Data were analyzed by Sphinx Software. Results: 52,5% of the participants of the survey said that ethics in research is an “interdisciplinary science that deals with the protection of all those involved in research with livings beings”. Among the members of the CEP who participated of the survey, 50% stated that the importance of the CEP resides in the fact of having increased the awareness about the relevance of ethics in research; while for 38,1% of the participant researchers of the survey, submitting research projects to ethical review is significant to protect themselves and the research participant, being this, in their opinion, the main reason to submission of the project to the CEP. Also were brought forward as motives the necessity to fulfill the requirements of the university, the research financiering institution, the data recollection institution, the CONEP and for publication. Conclusions: The CEP has assumed every time more significance and prominence as social mechanism of science control, which has direct relation with the improvement of the ethic consciousness of the researchers, the increase of scientific development of the institutions and the ethical-scientific quality of the researches. Key words: Ethics, Research, Ethics Committees, Ethical Review, Bioethics.
