Thesis Title: Subtitle

Ethical Issues

Before commencing research ethical approval was obtained from the University of Queensland and my application for ethical approval was reviewed and approved by The School of Social Science Ethical Review Committee. The central ethical issues in this research, as with much social science research, were that of informed consent, privacy and confidentiality.
Informed consent was obtained from the participants online before commencing the survey. Before commencing participants were asked to read the project information sheet (see Appendix 3) and before continuing with the survey, either select “Agree” or “Disagree”, in response to the following statement:

“I hereby agree to be involved in the above research project as a participant realising that I may withdraw at any time. I agree that the research data gathered for the study may be published and understand that information I provide is

anonymous and no identifying information will be used without my permission. I
have read the research information sheet pertaining to this research project and understand the nature of the research and my role in it.” Selecting “Agree” will be taken as an indication that the participant has read and understood the provided information. Selecting “Disagree” will direct the person away from the survey.

This process took place again at the beginning of the interview and participant observation. Face-to-face interviewees were again presented with a project information sheet and asked to provide informed consent. For interviews that took place via Skype, email, or instant messaging, participants were asked to indicate their consent and those participating in the survey, via web form, gave informed consent to which I provided the link.

Online non-participant observation is perceived to raise a unique set of ethical concerns as there is an ongoing debate regarding the obligations of a researcher in protecting the privacy of participants given the inherently public nature of the internet (Barker 2008: 25). Eysenbach and Till (2001) maintain that informed consent must be sought in all cases. For my research, informed consent was obtained from participants when recruiting them. In addition to obtaining informed consent from those included in non-participant observation, I also requested that participants post a message informing their friends that they are participating in a research project. This also provided a way for those interacting on the participants’ Facebook page to opt out, by responding to the post that they do not want their data to be collected. As the participants’ friend on Facebook, I was able to see these responses and kept a list of those who did not want to be included. Informed consent and the collaborative nature of Facebook is also an important consideration when considering the role of images in my analysis. When including images as part of the analysis I endeavoured to describe them as fully and as accurately as possible, rather than to present the actual images in order to maintain the confidentiality of participants. If this was not possible, then consent of the owner of the image, and any other persons in the picture was obtained before it is reproduced (Lazios 2000).

All data collected through the structured questionnaire, interviews and observation were stored as potentially identifiable, although participants were given pseudonyms in order to partially protect their identity. Once transcribed, recordings were permanently deleted. Any files stored on computer were password protected to allow access only by the researcher. Participation in the interview whether in person, over the phone or via instant messaging

was conducted in a private location. Participants were able to opt out at any time from the study.

As previously stated, a Facebook page for the research was established, containing updates about the project, contact details and information about the researcher, along with project information sheets. The Facebook page served as a way to keep participants fully informed about the progress of the research, allowing an avenue through which they could interact with the researcher and provide feedback. The Facebook page also directed participants to any relevant publications generated from the project