[Air-L] Researchers as new eyes on public data

[Lois Ann Scheidt]

Journalists routinely "process" information before writing, and they 
often present conclusions in their written work.  It is a LONG running 
IRB discussion why they are exempt from Human Subjects rules...but they 
are on the U.S. Federal level.  I understand that some universities are 
looking at making changes locally, and if they do more than pilot a 
requirement I will be watching closely.

In fact, I know of more than one case where a researcher/journalist 
asked for and received IRB approval for a project and published about 
"approved" and "unapproved" work from the same project.  The first was 
done as a social scientist, the second as a journalist.  Is it ethical? 
  Well I think that depends on how you look at issues like those we are 
discussing here.

Ed, I find it to be an incomplete argument that we are held to a higher 
standard then any of the other career paths you listed.  In fact, I 
would almost bet that  at least people reading this list has held one 
of those titles and been a social science researcher at the same time.  
And many of us blog and do social science research at the same time.

As a blogger my work has been studied and used as data in 
dissertations, and theses some with my permission some without.  Most 
of these products are available in whole or in part as digital text 
online.  So someone can search on either my given name or my blog's 
name and eventually find these published works.

I can tell you truthfully that I have never received a notifiable 
increase in visits to my blog after one is published.  But the day I 
was "Feedster Feed of the Day," back in 2005, I exhausted my monthly 
bandwidth by noon PST - in fact in two days I used as much bandwidth as 
I had in the previous eleven months.  Was I asked if I wanted to be 
included...no...I was not.  Did my inclusion have a cost to me...you 
bet, I had to pay money to up my bandwidth for the month, and from then 
forward as my readership grew.  Was I injured...well if you want to see 
it that way, sure I was.  Of course I also see the positive side of 
this as well...I got more readers and that was cool.

My point is that lots of other viewers have the power to cause much 
more harm than anything I do with my research.  It's an issue of 
"potential" harm first - and you plan to address all likely potentials 
- and then you learn from mistakes and unexpected outcomes after...that 
is the nature of social science research.

Lois Ann Scheidt

Doctoral Student - School of Library and Information Science, Indiana
University, Bloomington IN USA

Adjunct Instructor - School of Informatics, IUPUI, Indianapolis IN USA and
IUPUC, Columbus IN USA

Webpage:  http://www.loisscheidt.com
Blog:  http://www.professional-lurker.com