Re: [Air-L] facebook research - need some thoughts on facebook, and research ethics
Hi Mary, I think the issue you need to resolve is the issue of 'intervention' not 'intervention on facebook'.. What is your proposal? What is your research question? Having broken probably every one of the British Sociological Associations ethical guidelines at some point or other I would suggest that you explore a "positive/negative" approach. Whereby you argue that the breech of ethics is offset by the value of the research. However, intervention is not research (I crossed the boundary between research and intervention in my Pro-Ana research arguing that I was a human first and an researcher second) so who are you to intervene? Perhaps if we knew what you were looking at in a bit more detail we could help. I love ethical issues! haha. Pearse Stokes
Message: 2 Date: Tue, 3 Mar 2009 13:13:52 -0500 From: marybeth deline <mdeline@alumni.sfu.ca> Subject: [Air-L] facebook research - need some thoughts on facebook and research ethics To: air-l@listserv.aoir.org Message-ID: <516C6197-7713-4D87-98DF-55D6D3072983@alumni.sfu.ca> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; delsp=yes; format=flowed
Hi everyone,
My name's Mary Beth Deline and I'm currently a graduate candidate at the University of Waterloo - I'm hoping I can get some help from the list re: research ethics and Facebook. I'm currently checking out how feasible my thesis proposal is, which concerns using Facebook as a site for an intervention - either by developing an application or posting information on participant's walls (these participant's would have been recruited beforehand). I've contacted Facebook and they referred me to their Terms of Services and said that was all they could do for me. I'm having trouble finding someone who can help me match that (and their Developer Terms of Service) up to the Canadian Tri-Council ethical guidelines.
If anyone has any experience using Facebook as an intervention site, or is able to provide guidance/direction on FB and research ethics (either American or Canadian), could you please get in touch with me, on or off the list? I've reviewed the Tri-Council's Feb 08 recommendation paper on Internet research and have searched the archives on this list as well but haven't been able to find anything specifically about using FB as a research 'site'. Thanks in advance, MB
mdeline@alumni.sfu.ca
Stephanie Vie did a dissertation on social networking sites and had to articulate an ethnographic methodology together before conducting her research. I know that she has published articles based on the experience. I copied her on this reply, but it might be worth talking with her since she worked in Facebook for a year and a half. Jennifer On Wed, Mar 4, 2009 at 5:45 AM, Pearse Stokes <pearsestokes@gmail.com>wrote:
Hi Mary,
I think the issue you need to resolve is the issue of 'intervention' not 'intervention on facebook'.. What is your proposal? What is your research question?
Having broken probably every one of the British Sociological Associations ethical guidelines at some point or other I would suggest that you explore a "positive/negative" approach. Whereby you argue that the breech of ethics is offset by the value of the research. However, intervention is not research (I crossed the boundary between research and intervention in my Pro-Ana research arguing that I was a human first and an researcher second) so who are you to intervene?
Perhaps if we knew what you were looking at in a bit more detail we could help. I love ethical issues! haha.
Pearse Stokes
Message: 2 Date: Tue, 3 Mar 2009 13:13:52 -0500 From: marybeth deline <mdeline@alumni.sfu.ca> Subject: [Air-L] facebook research - need some thoughts on facebook and research ethics To: air-l@listserv.aoir.org Message-ID: <516C6197-7713-4D87-98DF-55D6D3072983@alumni.sfu.ca> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; delsp=yes; format=flowed
Hi everyone,
My name's Mary Beth Deline and I'm currently a graduate candidate at the University of Waterloo - I'm hoping I can get some help from the list re: research ethics and Facebook. I'm currently checking out how feasible my thesis proposal is, which concerns using Facebook as a site for an intervention - either by developing an application or posting information on participant's walls (these participant's would have been recruited beforehand). I've contacted Facebook and they referred me to their Terms of Services and said that was all they could do for me. I'm having trouble finding someone who can help me match that (and their Developer Terms of Service) up to the Canadian Tri-Council ethical guidelines.
If anyone has any experience using Facebook as an intervention site, or is able to provide guidance/direction on FB and research ethics (either American or Canadian), could you please get in touch with me, on or off the list? I've reviewed the Tri-Council's Feb 08 recommendation paper on Internet research and have searched the archives on this list as well but haven't been able to find anything specifically about using FB as a research 'site'. Thanks in advance, MB
mdeline@alumni.sfu.ca
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Hi Pearse Yes, I've broken a few rules myself but this is a MA student (I think)and she needs to learn the rules first and abide by them. And yes, the issue of intervention on Facebook is a particular consideration as it is likely a violation of their TOS. The fact that the student does not seem to have even bothered to read them closely even after being directed to them is also a concern. Rhiannon ________________________________ From: Pearse Stokes <pearsestokes@gmail.com> To: air-l@listserv.aoir.org Sent: Wednesday, March 4, 2009 3:45:51 AM Subject: Re: [Air-L] facebook research - need some thoughts on facebook, and research ethics Hi Mary, I think the issue you need to resolve is the issue of 'intervention' not 'intervention on facebook'.. What is your proposal? What is your research question? Having broken probably every one of the British Sociological Associations ethical guidelines at some point or other I would suggest that you explore a "positive/negative" approach. Whereby you argue that the breech of ethics is offset by the value of the research. However, intervention is not research (I crossed the boundary between research and intervention in my Pro-Ana research arguing that I was a human first and an researcher second) so who are you to intervene? Perhaps if we knew what you were looking at in a bit more detail we could help. I love ethical issues! haha. Pearse Stokes
participants (3)
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Jennifer deWinter -
Pearse Stokes -
Rhiannon Bury