A researcher who creates a testing situation or otherwise affects (deceives, places under stress) his/her subject(s) should definitely consider these concerns.
However, a researcher who simply observes and records what he/she sees in an uncontrolled (by the researcher) environment need not take responsibility for what occurs in that environment or to the observed. The allusion to the work of a historian seems fitting.
Putting aside the general topic of "ACADEMIC research" and considering once again the case at hand, do you (or does anyone) feel the research done by Mr. Schild involved deception or otherwise had the potential to harm the subjects involved?
-Spencer Madsen
Kathy Seifert wrote:
This is true, Spencer. There is also quite a bit of debate about the ethics of deception in research. I can only speak to what I know about sociology, psychology and social work research, but it seems that it is standard practice to design a debreifing process to implement with research participants in order to minimize the harmful impact of deception. The researchers are ethically bound to do their best to anticipate the harm that might be possible and to assume that deception will cause harm. The choice to deceive is only to be used if there is no other way to objectively gather the data and only because the value of adding to the body of literature outweighs the possible harm.Kathy Seifert----- Original Message -----From: Spencer MadsenSent: Wednesday, May 28, 2003 12:37 AMSubject: Re: FW: [Winona] WOD GoalsIf one informs one's subjects of their participation in an academic research project or goes so far as to explain the study's objectives to them, one can reasonably expect the results of the study to be unnecessarily colored, perhaps even to the point of negating the study altogether.
-Spencer Madsen
Charles, Ruth wrote:
[Winona Online Democracy]The difference is that this is a group discussion-you have to join it and you have to use your full name for all of your responses. Yes, anyone can use anything from it, but for critical ACADEMIC research you must inform people that you are going to use the information. --Ruth Charles
