[Air-L] Ethical challenges in qualitative research using Facebook

Tue Jul 26 06:54:19 PDT 2016

Hi Emily and Charles,
   regarding the use of paraphrasing as part of annonymization process vs. concerns about data integrity, it might be worth considering a model where the publication includes gated access to a database with the original quotes. Access to the original data could be granted for paper reviews and editors to verify that the paraphrasing retains the original meaning. After publication, other researchers could also request access to the original data if they can show a reasonable need and a good reputation for maintaining the privacy of research participants.

I don't have any prior experience with such a model, but thought it might be worth thinking about/discussing.

Best wishes,
Ansgar

Dr. Ansgar Koene
Senior Research Fellow: Horizon Policy Impact, CaSMa & UnBias
Horizon Digital Economy Research Institute
University of Nottingham
http://casma.wp.horizon.ac.uk/
http://unbias.wp.horizon.ac.uk/
http://www.horizon.ac.uk/
https://sites.google.com/site/arkoene/

________________________________________
From: Air-L [air-l-bounces at listserv.aoir.org] on behalf of Emily Wolfinger [emilywolfinger at hotmail.com]
Sent: 26 July 2016 07:59
To: Charles Ess
Cc: air-l at listserv.aoir.org
Subject: Re: [Air-L] Ethical challenges in qualitative research using   Facebook

Dear Charles,

Thanks for a most helpful response to my earlier email.  Please see my answers and comments below.

Best regards,

Emily

________________________________
From: Charles Ess <charles.ess at gmail.com>
Sent: Tuesday, 26 July 2016 4:14 PM
To: Emily Wolfinger
Cc: air-l at listserv.aoir.org
Subject: Re: [Air-L] Ethical challenges in qualitative research using Facebook

Hi Emily and colleagues,

First of all, kudos for your taking such good care at looking into these ethical dimensions of your research.

Secondly, a couple of questions: are the posts drawn exclusively from Australian FB users - and if so, what is the Australian law regarding what appears in a public context online?  In the U.S., last I knew, such postings are considered automatically copyrighted, and so one ethical-legal issue is, should this be the law in Australia as well, to recognize the posters as copyright holders. An important question, thank you.  I have read a bit about the Australian legal context, but need to explore this further.  Any comments from the Australian Internet research community about this would be great.

Thirdly, the methodological approach and its affiliated ethical challenges as you describe them are, in my somewhat limited experience, rather standard.  This means that I've seen similar projects - including ones involving far more sensitive expression - receive IRB and REB approval, so I would not stop with your worst-case scenarios (though these are clearly and carefully thought out - again, kudos).  This is heartening to hear.

Some possibilities.  In terms of dissemination / publication - would it be possible to (a) disguise many, if not the majority of posts by way of a paraphrase and/or aggregate identity (if appropriate), thereby avoiding direct citations, while (b) using some direct citations when absolutely necessary - and then requesting permission to do so?  While there are difficulties with requesting such permission, as you point out, in my experience (i.e., reading about and/or discussing similar cases in a variety of contexts - the U.S., the E.U., and Scandinavia), these are not insurmountable. To be sure, one needs to exercise caution regarding identity - though these days, it seems that the vast majority of FB identities are more or less authentic.  Ditto in the case of a vulnerable group, beginning with legal minors.  But with care, permission can be requested when necessary in ethically sensitive and responsible ways.  Of course, there will likely be a few instances of "no, thank you" (or less politely) - but with any luck, having to omit perhaps a handful of choice citations (and relegating them back into more anonymized form if possible / necessary), will not prevent you from having sufficient evidence and analyses to effectively respond to your research questions.
This is exactly the approach I wanted to take so I would be interested to hear from others about this.  My only concern is that some in the social science community (and I imagine beyond) take issue with paraphrasing or fabrication as a strategy for anonymising data .  Certainly Annette Markham whom you refer to below wrote about this in a 2012 article.   My main concern, however, is around the ethics of my research project so I would feel comfortable with this practice so long as it's widely accepted by the Internet research community.
Your arguments re approaching users for consent give me confidence in incorporating this  as a strategy in my ethics application.  I will certainly explore this further as an option.  Re your comment about the vast majority of Facebook identities as being more or less authentic, it would be great if you could point me to some research about this, thanks.

That's at least my first take - and I only offer these as first thoughts, knowing that there are real experts on this list, including several colleagues in Australia who will have better information about the Aussie context, as well as our colleagues Elizabeth Buchanan, Michael Zimmer, Annette Markham, and many others in the northern hemisphere with extensive experience in these domains as well who will have much more to add.

Hope this helps, then, as at least a helpful start in the discussion. Very helpful, thanks Charles.

Again, kudos and all best wishes,
- charles
--
Professor in Media Studies
Department of Media and Communication
University of Oslo
<http://www.hf.uio.no/imk/english/people/aca/charlees/index.html>
[http://www.hf.uio.no/imk/english/people/aca/charlees/charles-ess.jpg]<http://www.hf.uio.no/imk/english/people/aca/charlees/index.html>

Charles Melvin Ess - Department of Media and Communication<http://www.hf.uio.no/imk/english/people/aca/charlees/index.html>
www.hf.uio.no
Pfadenhauer, Michaela; Sugiyama, Satomi & Ess, Charles Melvin (2015). Editorial [introduction]: Special Issue of IJSR on Social Robots: Form, Content, Critique..

Editor, The Journal of Media Innovations
<https://www.journals.uio.no/index.php/TJMI/>

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On Tue, Jul 26, 2016 at 7:06 AM, Emily Wolfinger <emilywolfinger at hotmail.com<mailto:emilywolfinger at hotmail.com>> wrote:
Hi AoIR Community,

I am a PhD Candidate and I have run into some ethical issues in my research, which I am looking for some guidance on.

I am exploring Facebook user perceptions of sole mother poverty and welfare in Australia, focusing on a period of welfare debate in which sole parent pension amendments were introduced (May 2012-January 2013).  I'm undertaking a discourse analysis of a subset of comments across four categories of public pages and groups- media, political parties and ministers, welfare/charity organisations and sole mother networks- that were published in response to the amendments.

Although Facebook Data Policy considers this information public, Internet research ethics guidelines and other academic papers point to a number of ethical issues around publishing the comments of users without obtaining their consent.  As I am doing a post-structural discourse analysis this is unavoidable unless I consider paraphrasing or similar techniques that aim to protect the identity of users, however this strategy raises questions of scientific rigor and does not seem to be one that is widely used or indeed fool proof.  There are also issues around contacting users for consent, for example users could be underage or belong to other vulnerable groups.

I am left with two options if I take a worst case scenario approach to these dilemmas - either tweak my research question (for example to look at the posts of public figures and organisations such as media outlets) or consider alternative research methods which do not present the ethical challenges of discourse analysis or other methods of close analysis, but allow me to answer my research question (What were the Facebook user perceptions of sole mother poverty and welfare in Australia between May 2012 and January 2013?).

Any suggestions for readings, tips or advice regarding ways forward including methods would be most appreciated.

Many thanks in advance,

Emily
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