For this study, I joined 12 “closed” Facebook groups, which I observed over the course of the data collection period. I did not announce my presence to the groups or signal my intention to observe for research purposes. While the names of a closed Facebook group and its members are visible to any Facebook user, the content group members share is only visible to other members. In addition, users must request to join these groups. In responding to my request to join their groups, admins would have been able to see details from the “About” section of my Facebook profile, which include my status as a researcher at Michigan State University. But, I chose not to announce my presence in the groups as doing so would be nearly impossible without repeatedly posting to ensure the awareness of new members and could be considered disruptive to group norms and explicit rules for appropriate content. Most of the groups I joined had many thousands or tens of thousands of members (one has nearly 60,000 members to date) with members joining and leaving the group nearly constantly. As such, it did not seem practical or manageable to continually announce my presence and purpose in these groups. While I chose to “lurk,” rather than draw attention to myself, as Spicker (2011) points out, such covert observation does not necessarily imply deception, which “occurs where the nature of a researcher’s action is misrepresented to the research subject” (p. 119). Further, remaining unobserved eliminates concerns about changes in behavior as a result of being observed, i.e. the Hawthorne effect (Spicker, 2011).
Beyond technical markers of public vs. private, my ethical approach was also informed by considerations of perceived privacy, sensitivity of material, and vulnerability of users. In terms of perceived privacy, none of the groups I joined were “Secret” groups and some were even advertised on public webpages. As I mentioned, most groups I joined also had many thousands of members, which suggests that “group members could ‘reasonably expect to be observed by strangers’ (Townsend and Wallace, 2016, p. 8).” In terms of sensitivity of material, I observed some instances of group members mentioning group discussions in public blog posts. Moreover, topics discussed within the groups—namely, matters related to growing and maintaining Instagram accounts—are discussed widely and publicly outside of the groups, frequently by influencers on their personal blogs/vlogs. All this suggests that group discussions, generally, would not be considered sensitive to those participating in them (Whiteman, 2012).
In terms of vulnerability of users, members of these groups would not, categorically, be considered especially vulnerable or at risk. Given that the groups are for (aspiring) influencers, who are often known to come from privileged social groups (see Brooke Duffy’s book, (Not) Getting Paid to do What You Love), and that the topics of discussion appear to be relatively innocuous (from group members’ standpoint, as far as I can tell), it does not seem as though the members of the group require any special protections. However, all this being said, I did feel it was necessary to institute certain safeguards (Spicker, 2011) to protect the privacy of individuals within the groups I observed, as well as do my best to otherwise protect them from any potential (though unlikely) harmful effects of the research. As such, I altered all quotations drawn from the groups so that they would not be searchable (on the off chance a reader happens to be a member of one of the groups). In terms of using quotes for a purpose not intended by the speaker, I tried to draw quotes from public facing blog posts as much as possible. I found that bloggers frequently would reiterate the same sentiments as members of the groups I observed. Such public blog posts have publicity expectations (Richterich, 2018) and, thus, are quoted verbatim and cited. However, in many cases, quotations I came across in the groups were particularly telling and I felt it was important to include them (in altered form).
References
Duffy, B.E. (2017). (Not) getting paid to do what you love: gender, social media, and aspirational work. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
Richterich, A. (2018). Tracing controversies in hacker communities: Ethical considerations for internet research. Information, Communication & Society: 1–18. DOI: 10.1080/1369118X.2018.1486867.
Spicker, P. (2011). Ethical Covert Research. Sociology 45(1): 118–133. DOI: 10.1177/0038038510387195.
Townsend L. and Wallace C. (2016). Social media research: A guide to ethics. Available at: www.dotrural.ac.uk/socialmediaresearchethics.pdf
Whiteman, N. (2012). Undoing ethics: Rethinking practice in online research. New York, NY: Springer.
