[Air-L] Ethical problem in a Twitter reaserch

Mon Dec 18 02:39:38 PST 2017

As a small clarification of the clarification ...

I took the original post to be headed in the direction of wanting to 
avoid using material from minors, and that the primary question was then 
how to to do so.

Of course, as Sonia makes exquisitely clear, if the researcher does want 
to make use of material from minors / children, then a strongly 
different set of requirements comes into play.
Legally and ethically (to my knowledge), informed consent can generally 
be given by parents or guardians as proxies for the children - but 
within the boundaries spelled out, e.g., in the documents / frameworks 
Sonia points to if the research is within the relevant jurisdictions.

But however that may be, Sonia's plea for a child-rights approach is (of 
course) also very helpful - in part as it points to the distinction I 
mentioned between what may be legally acceptable but what some 
researchers, especially from deontological (rights-oriented) and/or care 
ethics perspectives, would consider ethically requisite: namely, 
whatever the technical and legal aspects - what are the _expectations_ 
of the persons in play here?
There are many, many examples of researchers who, taking the latter 
perspective(s), have chosen to respect the expectations of privacy held 
by their informants, even when such expectations are not legally or 
technically supported.
Such respect then includes precisely respect for rights to privacy, and 
thus would trigger guidelines and practices for protecting those rights 
for minors.
I suspect that Sonia has considerably more than this in mind by a 
"childs-rights approach to research ethics," but perhaps this is one 
point of overlap?

Will, of course, be eager to see / read / learn of other perspectives 
and experiences as well.

again, many thanks,
- c.

On 18/12/17 10:59, Charles M. Ess wrote:
> perfect - thanks for the most helpful clarification, Sonia!
> - c.
> 
> On 18/12/17 10:35, Livingstone,S wrote:
>> Children cannot legally consent to use of their personal data, 
>> precisely because they are children. Hence in the US COPPA applies, 
>> and in Europe the General Data Protection Regulation., both of which 
>> require verifiable parental consent for the use of children's personal 
>> data. Much depends on the legal definition of personal data, of course.
>>
>> I would also urge a child-rights approach to research ethics. For 
>> instance, contrary to what many researchers believe, and contrary to 
>> companies' T&C, in my research children have told me that they 
>> consider Facebook to be public and Twitter to be privacy (cf 
>> Nissenbaum's contextual integrity).  So my understanding is that this 
>> is incorrect below, and that much social media research is improper....
>>
>> Best, Sonia
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Air-L [mailto:air-l-bounces at listserv.aoir.org] On Behalf Of 
>> Charles M. Ess
>> Sent: 18 December 2017 08:58
>> To: Lior Beserman <liorbeserman at gmail.com>; air-l at listserv.aoir.org
>> Subject: Re: [Air-L] Ethical problem in a Twitter reaserch
>>
>> Hi,
>>
>> one fairly standard approach is to go ahead and conduct your research 
>> - though probably with the additional step of setting up a second 
>> database that assigns random identifiers to the original accounts / 
>> profiles.
>>
>> Once you have completed your analyses - then the question becomes what 
>> you need to include as explicit quotes in the publication / 
>> dissemination phase.  Typically, these are only a few - i.e., in 
>> contrast with 10s if not 100s of thousands (if not more) of texts 
>> gathered in.
>> Whereas informed consent is impossible for the latter - it is 
>> considerably more feasible for the former.  So one possibility is to 
>> contact the writers you want to quote and ask for their permission.
>>
>> Of course, this will not directly address the question as to whether 
>> they are minors - and you're exactly right that this is a critical 
>> ethical (and, in many jurisdictions, a legal) issue.
>>
>> At this point, some will argue that this is not your problem - the 
>> informants have read (well, at least clicked through) the ToS and that 
>> such posts are by a kind of default public and so don't require 
>> anything more than acknowledgement (copyright to the author).  If a 
>> minor is involved, on this view, ethical obligations to vulnerable 
>> populations are overridden by a kind of legal coverage ostensibly 
>> provided by their agreeing to the ToS.
>>
>> Others - especially from deontological and ethics of care perspectives 
>> - will argue that protection of minors overrides any legal contract 
>> established in the ToS.  How you directly ascertain the identity of 
>> someone on Twitter while asking for their permission to use their 
>> quote is, of course, not unproblematic.  But these days, it's harder 
>> to be a dog unnoticed as a dog on the Internet and so it might be more 
>> straightforward than say 10 or certainly 20 years ago.
>>
>> My 2 cents - good luck and looking forward to the discussion!
>>
>> - charles
>>
>> On 18/12/17 07:46, Lior Beserman wrote:
>>> Dear  Air-L Community,
>>>
>>> I have encountered an ethical problem which I am sure I am not the
>>> first to encounter and so would appreciate your say on the matter.
>>> I am doing a discourse analysis on a twitter hashtag and I have no way
>>> to discern that I am not using under age (under 18) users tweets.
>>> As there are completely different questions and guidelines to research
>>> minors from an ethical perspective, I was wondering how other people
>>> have dealt with this problem in their research?
>>>
>>> Thank you,
>>> Lior Beserman Navon,
>>>
>>> Ph.D. Candidate
>>>
>>> The Department of Sociology & Anthropology
>>>
>>> The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
>>> _______________________________________________
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>>
>> -- 
>> Professor in Media Studies
>> Department of Media and Communication
>> University of Oslo
>> <http://www.hf.uio.no/imk/english/people/aca/charlees/index.html>
>>
>> Postboks 1093
>> Blindern 0317
>> Oslo, Norway
>> c.m.ess at media.uio.no
>> _______________________________________________
>> The Air-L at listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the 
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> 

-- 
Professor in Media Studies
Department of Media and Communication
University of Oslo
<http://www.hf.uio.no/imk/english/people/aca/charlees/index.html>

Postboks 1093
Blindern 0317
Oslo, Norway
c.m.ess at media.uio.no