Felice J. Levine and Paula R. Skedsvold, “Behavioral and Social Science Research“, in The Oxford Textbook of Clinical Research Ethics, ed. by Ezekiel J. Emanuel, a. o. Oxford UP, 2008. ch. 32.
Codes for behavioral and social sciences: Belmont report, DHHS’s Policy for Protection of Human Research Subjects.
Examples: anthropology, economics, political science, psychology, sociology, linguistics, educational research, geography, demography, sociolegal studies etc.
Ethics became an explicit topic in social sciences during the 1960-70s. APA was first professional organization to make an ethics code.
Ethical challenges. Experimental methods. Is it ethical to cause memory overload, stress etc to experiment with cognitive abilities?
Observational methods. How invasive can the researcher get? Different levels of privacy: a party, a public sports event. On the other hand, is it ethical to observe youngsters drinking or bullying?
Survey methods. Main factors are questionnaire content, mode of administration, recruitment strategies, mechanisms to increase participation. Other issues: privacy, data storage.
Interview methods. Mostly same as survey problems. In addition: degree of structure in the interview, sensitive responses, disclosure following group interviews, recruitment through the use of interviews.
Etnographic methods. Includes many of the described tools – interviews, observations, document or audiovisual analysis. Problems – observation can lead to attachment to the subjects (e.g. observing domestic violence), observation can often take a long time, involves building trust, differentiating casual talk and research.
Analysis of public data files. Biggest problem is the creation of those files which has to involve de-identification of the data.
Cross-cutting issues.
Deception – participants have to understand what they are asked. And what for.
Incentives – it’s OK to compensate participants’ effort but not OK to buy them in.
New stuff
Internet research – data storage, transmission, handling, confidentiality, privacy, boundary between public and private.
Geospatial measurements and other tracking methods. Personal identification problems.
Third party – talking about your friend’s, parents’ or else’s health, details etc. How to handle this kind of information?