[Air-L] Conducting qualitative research on Facebook

Wed Feb 7 14:05:43 PST 2018

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 at american.edu <mailto:trevisan at 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 at fulbrightmail.org>
> To: Sarah Quinton <sequinton at brookes.ac.uk>
> Cc: Sharon Greenfield <s3417013 at student.rmit.edu.au>,
> 	"air-l at listserv.aoir.org" <air-l at listserv.aoir.org>
> Subject: Re: [Air-L] Conducting qualitative research on Facebook
> Message-ID:
> 	<CADeSpGU0f_wTuyo4KjQh367LNP2-7yAYa0rcLoD=b=SMiGA1KA at 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 at 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 at 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 at 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
>>>> 
>>>> QUT researcher.
>>>> _______________________________________________
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>>>> 
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>>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> --
>> Dr Sarah  Quinton  FHEA MIDM
>> Chair of Oxford Brookes University Research Ethics Committee
>> Senior Lecturer in Marketing
>> Marketing Department,
>> Business School, Room CLC G.14
>> Oxford Brookes University
>> Headington  Campus
>> Oxford. OX3 0BP
>> +44 1865 485694
>> 
>> *Skype: sarah.quinton5*
>> 
>> www.sarahquinton.co.uk
>> www.twitter.com/quinton_digital
>> 
>> https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__uk.linkedin.com_in_sarahquinton&d=DwICAg&c=U0G0XJAMhEk_X0GAGzCL7Q&r=CYqwEkyUTxOfkX8u0h7MJ1VKiRhFw3f1HrsRtFJ-2bk&m=B4RFidivQ4CrBcsZpgfBtm1r7CfgAUgQg2YgDpVv4-w&s=HYpuOc4r_voqhwAYGHvIbWt0-xPgiwKFgYBMduAa-qU&e=
>> <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__uk.linkedin.com_in_sarahquinton&d=DwICAg&c=U0G0XJAMhEk_X0GAGzCL7Q&r=CYqwEkyUTxOfkX8u0h7MJ1VKiRhFw3f1HrsRtFJ-2bk&m=B4RFidivQ4CrBcsZpgfBtm1r7CfgAUgQg2YgDpVv4-w&s=HYpuOc4r_voqhwAYGHvIbWt0-xPgiwKFgYBMduAa-qU&e=>
>> 
>> *Please note that  from October  2017 Dr Karen Handley is now the Business
>> Faculty Ethics Officer and  she can be emailed at khandley at brookes.ac.uk
>> <khandley at brookes.ac.uk> concerning  PhD student or staff research ethics
>> issues.*
>> 
>> 
>> Recent publications:
>> *Out Now*: Quinton, S., and Reynolds, R. (2018*),The Ethics of Online
>> Research. *Ed Kandy Woodfield, The changing roles of researchers and
>> participants in digital and social media research, chap 3, 53-78.
>> 
>> 
>> 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
>> 
>> *Current research project* - Sharing photographs online and on social media
>> by older people: a mitigator of social isolation and loneliness. Funded by
>> the Sir Halley Stewart Trust, in partnership with The Open University.
>> _______________________________________________
>> The Air-L at listserv.aoir.org mailing list
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> 
> 