Re: [Air-L] Conducting qualitative research on Facebook
Hi Virginia, Paul Reilly and I have two articles on the ethics of researching (and specifically quoting/not quoting from) public Facebook group pages that may be useful to you: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1369118X.2014.889188 <http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1369118X.2014.889188> http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1369118X.2015.1104373 <http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1369118X.2015.1104373> As others have said, context is key - both in terms of the potential sensitivity of the issues you are investigating and risk to (potentially unaware) participants. There are creative ways to convey results without necessarily quoting directly from Facebook posts and we discuss some of these in the article. Best, Filippo ——— Filippo Trevisan, Ph.D. Assistant Professor - School of Communication Deputy Director - Institute on Disability and Public Policy (IDPP) American University 4400 Massachusetts Avenue NW Washington, DC - 20016 Tel: +1 (202) 885 6930 Email: trevisan@american.edu <mailto:trevisan@american.edu> Web: www.filippotrevisan.net <http://www.filippotrevisan.net/> New book: “Disability Rights Advocacy Online: Voice, Empowerment and Global Connectivity <https://www.routledge.com/Disability-Rights-Advocacy-Online-Voice-Empowerment-and-Global-Connectivity/Trevisan/p/book/9781138847828>” NY: Routledge, 2016. All my publications: www.filippotrevisan.net/publications <http://www.filippotrevisan.net/publications>
Date: Wed, 7 Feb 2018 10:37:30 +0100 From: Dariusz Jemielniak <dariusz.jemielniak@fulbrightmail.org> To: Sarah Quinton <sequinton@brookes.ac.uk> Cc: Sharon Greenfield <s3417013@student.rmit.edu.au>, "air-l@listserv.aoir.org" <air-l@listserv.aoir.org> Subject: Re: [Air-L] Conducting qualitative research on Facebook Message-ID: <CADeSpGU0f_wTuyo4KjQh367LNP2-7yAYa0rcLoD=b=SMiGA1KA@mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"
while agreeing with previous commenters, I would also like to add that translating from another language often gives an additional layer of security (it makes it more difficult to track the quotes back to the original). If you're going to publish in English, as often is the case, doing fieldwork in a different language adds to the safety.
cheers,
dj
On Wed, Feb 7, 2018 at 9:52 AM, Sarah Quinton <sequinton@brookes.ac.uk> wrote:
Hello Virginia
You should check the QUT Ethics committee's policies as sensibly suggested by Sharon.
You also might want to consider both the context of your research, i.e. the sensitivity of the phenomenon you are researching ( is it discussions about gardening or is it content about being a carer for someone with long term illness) and also the vulnerability of the Facebook participants you wish to include in the research ( obviously there are limits to what you can determine about these people's vulnerability but it is worth thinking about, is the group in any way self identifying as vulnerable or identified by others/researchers as vulnerable?).
You may also wish to consider anonymising the content without fundamentally altering the meaning ( again depending on what you need from the data and how you will be analysing it) if you are thinking about reproducing it anywhere in your research, so that it is more difficult to trace back to the poster/originator through search engines. This is another approach to 'protecting' the Facebook participants.
I am sure other members of AoIR will have valuable comments too.
Sarah
On 7 February 2018 at 05:59, Sharon Greenfield < s3417013@student.rmit.edu.au
wrote:
Hello Virginia,
I would suggest reading up on Mary L Gray's many pieces on ethics in online research. In addition, what does the QUT Ethics Committee recommend?
Cheers, Sharon
On 7 February 2018 at 16:38, Virginia Balfour < virginiabalfour@hotmail.com
wrote:
Hello
I would value advice on the ethics of collecting data from an Open Facebook page and the best ways to mitigate them.
My research is looking at an open Facebook page and it is likely that I will want to use data from conversations between commenters and statements made by commenters as part of my research. While most observations will be generalised and made anonymous, there may be some conversations where it is pertinent to identify the commenters and/or identifiable comments.
In particular I am interested in whether people think it is necessary or advisable to contact individual commenters to ask if their comments can be used in the research?
Are their any risk mitigation strategies that anyone has used in the past that they could recommend?
regards
Virginia Balfour
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Quinton, S., Canhoto, A., Molinillo, S., Pera, R. & Budhathoki, T. (2017). Conceptualising a digital orientation: antecedents of supporting SME performance in the digital economy, *Journal of Strategic Marketing*, 1-13. Quinton, S. and Simkin, L. (2016). The Digital Journey: reflected learning and emerging challenges, *International Journal of Management Reviews, * (forthcoming) DOI:10.1111/ijmr.1204
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Filippo Trevisan