The mission of AJOB Primary Research is to advance the pursuit of empirical work in bioethics through the publication of primary research in bioethics and conceptual analyses of the relationship between descriptive and normative inquiry. AJOB Primary Research broadly construes empirical bioethics to include social scientific research applied to bioethical questions, health policy and health services research as it relates to bioethics, and other forms of original research including evidence-based literature reviews and commentary on new developments in empirical bioethics.

AJOB Primary Research welcomes submissions that employ quantitative, qualitative or mixed empirical methods from the broad range of disciplines relevant to bioethics inquiry. The journal seeks to disseminate empirical bioethics scholarship to those who practice and do research in a variety of clinical, legal, academic, scientific, and religious disciplines.