Think of the communities you are part of. How comfortable would you be if someone studied them? Why?
In light of our discussion, I will share that I joined the Facebook community for research purposes 3 years ago. I determined that I needed to be part of a community that I was researching. Instead of writing and read from the outside looking in, I wanted to step inside the circle and view the community. I was not commenting on individual accounts, but the community as a whole - why do people join? how do they establish their ethos online through their communities? norms of the different communities?
As we discussed the appeals of logos, ethos, and pathos in my classes as an introduction to persuasive messages, I share my experience researching ethos in a Facebook community. I always notice the reaction of students. Many begin to be uncomfortable (I'm deducing that they are wondering if I have seen their site), some tell me they're glad I didn't reach my own conclusions from reading about it but instead experienced it. I don't asked if they are surprised because I'm in the "over 40"age group.
I visit my site maybe weekly, mostly monthly. I've joined listservs before but don't have the time to keep up with the information. I would not want someone to publish my name and/or publish subjective opinions of why I felt a certain way by reading what I post on Facebook. If someone wanted to research the activity of those over a certain age bracket and I was in that age group, I would not have a problem with sharing # of pics posted, # of times accessed, etc. These are gray lines; however, and depend on the individual. Determining policies for IRBs will be challenging. I look forward to reading others' posts.
Researching online groups is a difficult topic to grasp as our text for this week discusses. One side note - it was news to me that some scholars reject going through the IRB process. I thought it was required for publishing.
Debra
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3 comments:
You ask some good questions, Debra, and as you note elsewhere, communities are often in flux, and thus even harder to research.
What's so often problematic in research is the "out of context" representation. That is, a post out of context of a heated (or otherwise) discussion, a blog that responds to something not noted, etc. I think what we're going to have to do is a lot more member checking to make sure that our representation of the text is accurate.
However, it gets tricky; what if you're trying to represent a heated discussion, and one party is fine with their representation, yet the other one isn't? I think then the researcher is in a bind if he/she has agreed to only publish if everyone agrees.
RE: the IRB, I only know that, at TTU, you can publish WITHOUT IRB if you're studying a public site. However, I would suggest going through IRB anyway, getting an "exempt" approval, just to be safe.
Becky,
Every time I think I have a handle of new issues regarding online research, you share another issue :) I'm finding this course so stimulating.
While this may seem "out of context," I did ask Donna Peters if my IRB from last fall had expired. I've had one hospitalist contact me who can now meet with me. She said that I'm cleared as long as I stay within the guidelines that I original established. I do like good news!
As an online instructor you've probably experienced the "tricky" part as you mentioned with online class dialogue. Some students might be kidding and some might take their comments seriously. Also, someone might make note of some news item that might cause an emotional response by another student. I can definitely see the point you're making. Just as in F2F discussion, online discussion can't be robotic - with any discussion of any quality, a deep discussion takes place. The risk is emotion.
Debra Burleson
Debra - I find it interesting that you deduced students were uncomfortable that people researched the Facebook community. I know among my groups of friends and coworkers they don't mind who sees their page. (I'm speaking primarily of MySpace). We know that it is public and easily searchable. I would hope students would find it rather cool that you took the time to learn about their community. You do bring up some interesting issues though. I just assumed that no one would have a problem being researched, but this class has shown me various reasions why individuals would object to scrutiny.
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