Thanks Charles I think the question also falls in the more broad computer ethics and is not limited to just researchers. I wonder if some of you wonderful researchers out there would call yourselves computer ethics researchers? Are there any of you coming from this applied philosophy field. I should note in some of my volunteer work I am under a duty to report. If I am on-line tomorrow in second life I will try to join the research ethics group for a discussion. On 14-Sep-06, at 11:30 PM, Charles Ess wrote:
Sooooo, I'm turning the question around to you: at what point do people have a responsibility to "intervene" in something they see online and if that point comes, what form should their reaction take?
Nice question!
This is a significant issue specifically in Internet Research Ethics, especially for those researching adolescent / young adult websites. Our very own Susannah Stern has written two insightful and helpful articles on this, based in part on her own experience with encountering a mention of suicidal thoughts on a young woman's website, and then discovering a few months later that the young woman had in fact killed herself.
Peter Timusk, B.Math statistics (2002), B.A. legal studies (2006) Carleton University Fall 2006 Systems Science Graduate student, University of Ottawa. just trying to stay linear. Read by hundreds of lurkers every week.