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Reconsidering Self and Other:
The methods, politics, and ethics of representation in Online
Ethnography Annette N. Markham © copyright Annette N. Markham 2004, all rights reserved draft of forthcoming
chapter for N. K. Denzin and Y. S. Lincoln (2004). Handbook of Qualitative Research (
Whether one studies the
Internet as a social structure or utilizes Internet-based technologies as
tools for research, Internet-based technologies change the research
scenario. Computer-mediation has a
significant influence on many aspects of communication practice and theory. The
internet has similarities to many earlier media for communication, such as
letter writing, telephone, telegraph, post-it notes, and so forth. At the same time, the capacities and uses
of Internet communication are unique in configuration and shape a user’s (and
thus the researcher’s) perceptions and interactions. These influences extend beyond the
interpersonal; outcomes of these communication processes have the potential
to shift sensemaking practices at the cultural level. We are, as Gergen (1991) notes, saturated
in technologies. The Internet and
associated communication media permeate and alter interactions and the
possible outcomes of these interactions at the dyadic, group, and cultural
level. Equally, Internet technologies
have the potential to shift the ways in which qualitative researchers
collect, make sense of, and represent data. In online environments, self, other,
and social structures are constituted through interaction, negotiated in
concert with others. The extent to
which information and communication technology (ICT) can mediate one’s
identity and social relations should call us to epistemological attention. Whether or not we do research of physical
or online cultures, new communication technologies highlight the dialogic
features of social reality, compelling scholars to reexamine traditional
assumptions and previously taken-for-granted rubrics of social research. In the early 1990s, as the capacities
of the Internet became more publicly known and accessed, the use of the
Internet for the development of personal relationships and social structures
grew, as did the study of computer-mediated subjectivity and community. Through a phone line, access to the
Internet, and specialized software, people could meet and develop
relationships with others from the privacy of their homes. People could do this anonymously if they
chose, creating personae that were similar to or highly distinctive from what
they perceived their physical personae to be.
They could create or join communities based on like-mindedness rather
than physical proximity. During the early ‘90s when Internet and
virtual reality technologies caught public and scholarly interest, the study
of computer mediated communication (CMC) worked from theoretical
extremes: On the one hand,
computer-mediated communication was lauded as a means of transcending the
limits associated with human embodiment.
By erasing socio-cultural markers such as race and gender or escaping
the body altogether, virtual communication would lead to a utopian society
whereby democratic participation in public discourse was unhindered by
physicality and corresponding stereotypes.
At the other extreme, skeptics critiqued CMC because it removed
essential socio-emotional or nonverbal cues and would result in impoverished,
low-trust relationships at best and social withdrawal, at worst. Citizens would resemble hackers; pale, reclusive,
and prone to eating pizza and Chinese take-out. As time passed, use grew, novelty
diminished, and more measured accounts emerged based less on theoretical
speculation and more on study of actual contexts[1]. It became clear that meaningful and
significant relationships and social structures could thrive in text-only
online environments. This capacity is
now taken for granted. The past decade
of communication has included forms new to many of us: email, mailing lists, Multi User Dimensions
(MUDs or MOOs), real time
chatrooms, instant messaging, websites, blogs, and
so forth. We are now familiar with the
concepts of cybersex, online marriages, Friendster, and other creative uses of technology to
enact identity and relationships though computer-mediation. Many of us can probably name close
colleagues and friends whom we would not recognize in person. The computer-mediated construction of
self, other, and social structure constitutes a unique phenomenon for
study. In online environments, the
construction of identity is a process which must be initiated more
deliberately or consciously. Offline,
the body can simply walk around and be responded to by others, providing the
looking glass with which one comes to know the self. Online, the first step toward existence is
the production of discourse, whether in the form of words, graphic images, or
sounds. But as many scholars have
taught us (E.g., Buber, 1958; Bakhtin, 1981; Blumer, 1969; Laing, 1961), we understand our Self only in concert with
Other, a continual dialogic process of negotiation and a great deal of faith
in shared meaning (Rommetveit, 1980). In most computer-mediated environments,
this process requires a more deliberate exchange of information because
people are not co-present in the same physical space and the nonverbal aspects
of the process are, for the most part, missing. The process is obfuscated because a person
typically takes knowledge of self for granted with little reflection on the
social, interactive process by which the self is negotiated with others in
context. Mostly overlooked by users,
the production of the message is only the first part of the process: Whether by receiving a reply message or by
tracking a virtual footprint of a visitor to one’s website, one can only know
if one has been acknowledged through some sort of response. McKinnon’s insights in this matter (1995)
warrant repeating here. He notes that
the common phrase “I think, therefore I am” is woefully inadequate in cyberspace. Even “I speak, therefore I am” is not
enough. In cyberspace, the more
appropriate phrase is “I am perceived, therefore I am.” (p. 119).
Implied in this last phrase is the fact that online, perception of
another’s attention is only known by overt response. So we can usefully note this by adding the
phrase “I am responded to, therefore I am” ( The participant statements (from my
previous research of internet users) at the beginning of this chapter
represent well the importance of text to a person’s construction and
negotiation of identity in online text based environments. Sherie expresses
a desire to be known solely as text (not through, but as text). For sherie,
computer-mediated communication is a way of being. Joan always used correct punctuation and
strives to make the meaning as clear as possible. Text is perceived as a powerful means of
controlling, through editing and backspacing, the way the self is presented
to others. dominOH!,
unlike the other two, does not pay much attention to the textual, linguistic
aspects of the medium. Rather, dominOH! uses the technology as an interaction space
which protects anonymity and allows the social self to be less firmly
attached to the body. Yet the text is
vital to the researcher’s understanding of dominOH!’s
persona online. For all three personae interviewed,
text remains the means through which each performs and negotiates the
self. None of these textual entities
exist in isolation. Their existence is made possible because they exist in
direct or perceived interaction with others.
They are communicative through and through; their social being is
initiated through a process of creating and sending a message and negotiated
through a process of interaction. Although we recognize that reality is
socially negotiated through discursive practice, the dialogic nature of
identity and culture is thrown into high relief in computer-mediated
environments. This gives rise to many
possibilities and paradoxes in social research. For any researcher studying life online,
the traditional challenge of understanding other-in-context is complicated by
the blatant interference of the researcher into the frame of the field and by
the power of the researcher in representing the culture. Researchers have always interfered with the
context in some way while conducting research. In the past three or more decades scholars
have problematized this feature of research, as well as highlighted the
blurring of boundaries between researcher and researched. Still, these issues become startlingly
apparent—and challenging—in the context of CMC environments. These issues call not only for
adjustment of traditional methods to online environments or the creation of
new methods, but also for across-the-board reassessment and interrogation of
the premises of qualitative inquiry in general. Interestingly, the specific logistic and
analytic problems associated with the interpretive study of computer-mediated
personae reveal many weaknesses in qualitative methods and epistemologies,
generally. In the years I have spent
trying to figure out how to make sense of participants whose gender, name,
body type, age, ethnicity, class, and location remain inexplicable, I have
been compelled to seriously examine certain practices of Othering
which, despite efforts to be reflexive, hide in everyday, embodied ways of
knowing. Put more positively, studying
computer-mediated interactions allows and encourages exploration of what is
happening in “the hyphen that both separates and merges personal identities
with our inventions of Others” (Fine, 1994, p. 70). New communication technologies
privilege and highlight certain features of interaction while obscuring
others, confounding traditional methods of capturing and examining the
formative elements of relationships, organizations, communities and
cultures. Additionally, a person’s
conceptual framework of any new communication technology will predetermine,
to a certain extent, that person’s understanding of, response to, and
interaction with the technology. This
complicates the researcher’s ability to assume commonalities among
participants’ communicative practices via CMC, or to presume that
participants understand and use the technology in the same way the researcher
does. The challenge for the
qualitative researcher in the computer-mediated environment is to attend to
the details of how one is going about the process of getting to know
something about the context and the persons being studied. At the same time, examining one’s own
influence in the shape of the outcome is a vital practice. Grappling with both the practical and the
epistemological implications of this influence can help researchers make more
socially responsible decisions. In a
very real sense, every method decision is an ethics decision, in that these
decisions have consequences for not just research design but also the
identity of the participants, the outcomes of our studies, and the character
of knowledge which inevitably grows from our work in the field. In this chapter, I describe some of the
tensions and complications that can arise in the qualitative study of
internet-mediated contexts when decisions must be made about: 1) Defining the
boundaries of the field; 2) Determining what constitutes data; 3)
Interpreting the other as text; 4) Using embodied sensibilities to interpret textuality; and 5) Representing the other ethically in
research reports. My overall object in
this discussion is to illustrate some of the challenges of doing research in
computer-mediated environments and to display the significance of the
researcher’s choices on the field’s structure, on the other’s embodied or
reported Being, and ultimately, on the social knowledge derived from the
research project. The discussion is
intended to help researchers generate questions which can be used to
interrogate their own epistemological and axiological assumptions throughout
the design and enactment of the inquiry.
In addition to this primary train of thought, I talk briefly about how
the Internet is conceptualized, review some of the main shifts in thinking
about qualitative internet research, and discuss some of the major ethical
considerations which are entwined with this type of inquiry. To clarify what this chapter does and
does not do: First, this chapter
focuses on textuality. The examples throughout this chapter draw
primarily on text-based computer-mediated discourse and interactions among
participants or between participant and researcher. Although technologies facilitate visual and
audio simulations and representations and capacities of the traditional PC is
moving to mobile or convenience devices, text remains a primary unit of
analysis for the qualitative researcher.
Put differently, the issues raised here apply equally to multi-media
aspects of CMC because these are, for the most part, analyzed as texts,
broadly speaking. Second, even though this chapter
focuses on computer-mediated contexts, the spirit of these arguments applies
to other forms of interaction, both online and offline. The intriguing thing about CMC is that it
calls attention to the ways we literally see and make sense of the world and
points out many of the biases inherent in our traditional ways of seeing and
knowing. Therefore, one should not
dismiss the challenges discussed herein even if doing radically different
types of qualitative research. Third, this chapter does not seek to
provide an overview of how qualitative research is conducted on or via the
Internet, but rather, addresses key epistemological and methodological
questions facing ethnographers researching in social spaces constituted in
part or wholly through new communication technologies. Many sources exist to aid the researcher
with specific procedures and methods for qualitative studies (this volume)
and qualitative internet studies (e.g., Johns, Chen, &Hall, 2003; Mann
and Stewart, 2000). Finally, this chapter focuses more on
problems and challenges than opportunities and potential of CMC related
research environments. This imbalance
is not indicative of my own or a general attitude toward qualitative internet
research. Here, however, I want to
build a case for cautious, reflexive, and prepared research which, while
celebrating those aspects of new communication technologies that make them
well suited for qualitative inquiry, remains attentive to the consequences of
one’s research choices. Shifting lenses The study of CMC spans
virtually every academic discipline and methodological approach. Research objects and lenses have shifted
rapidly in the past decade or so, commensurate with the rapid development and
dissemination of information and communication technologies (ICT). Qualitative study of ICT in the past decade
has tended to shift in two ways.
First, though not a universal trend, research has tended to shift from
strongly polarized depictions and predictions in the early 1990s, to more
descriptive accounts in the mid-late 1990s and, in the new century, to more
theoretically grounded, comparative, or theory building studies. Accounts of CMC, identity,
and culture throughout the early 90s were heavily influenced by pop culture
descriptions of and personal experience with novel and exciting forms of
interaction. Gibson’s term Cyberspace, coined
in his science fiction novel Neuromancer,
offered the elusive but intriguing definition of online experience as: “a
consensual hallucination experienced daily by billions of legitimate
operators, in every nation, by children being taught mathematical
concepts...A graphical representation of data abstracted from the banks of
every computer in the human system.
Unthinkable complexity. Lines
of light ranged in the non-space of the mind, clusters and constellations of
data. Like city lights, receding…” (1984).
About virtual reality, Rheingold (1991) told readers “we
have to decide fairly soon what it is we as humans ought to become, because
we’re on the brink of having the power of creating any experience we desire”
(p. 386, emphasis in original). Wright
(1994) told us simply that it would “deeply change politics, culture, and the
fabric of society--if not, indeed, the very metaphysics of human existence”
(p. 101). Barlow offered a vision of
Cyberspace as the Wild West, a final frontier to be claimed: “Cyberspace . . . is presently inhabited
almost exclusively by mountain men, desperadoes and vigilantes, kind of a
rough bunch. . . . And as long as
that’s the case, it’s gonna be the Law of the Wild
in there” (cited in Woolley, 1993, pp. 122-123). Keep (1995) suggested that virtuality
through computer mediated communication “announces the end of the body, the
apocalypse of corporeal subjectivity” (p. 4).
These ideas caught the imagination of
scholars and influenced significantly the tone of research. This is not surprising: With the invention
or new use of every communication technology in the past century, claims
regarding media effects tend to be overestimated and exaggerated as long as
the technology remained novel.
Although this period was not without empirically based and
theoretically grounded research, there was an feeling of utopianism in descriptions
of how technology might (or should) free us from the constraints of worldwide
shackles like hierarchy, traditional social stereotypes, embodiment, and even
death. Rheingold’s Homesteading on
the electronic frontier, Benedikt’s edited
collection Cyberspace: First steps
(1991) represent this trend well. To
give these authors credit, their ideas sparked the interest of many scholars
whose work followed. Simultaneously, research was influenced
by news coverage, movies, and pop culture accounts that predicted negative,
even dire consequences of this new Internet era. Time Magazine offered a cover story
on ‘Cyberporn,’ wherein readers learned that the
Internet threatened our children’s’ safety (from adult sexual predators) and
innocence (from easy access to pornography).
Vastly exaggerated claims incited sound criticism; the magazine
editors had relied exclusively on evidence supplied by an undergraduate
student’s non-peer-reviewed study.
Critiqued or not, this issue of Time was quoted by legislators,
parents, and scholars. “Internet
Addiction Disorder” entered the medical lexicon in 1996. Popular films spelled out the dangers of
identity theft, hackers, and spending too much time in front of one’s
computer. Pundits predicted that face
to face interactions would become impoverished as people forgot the
intricacies and delicacies of human interaction in physical environments. These swings have evened out in the last few
years, resulting in published accounts which exhibit many of the more traditional
characteristics of social research.
Scholars are explaining their approach and methods more carefully,
grounding their work in previous research more thoroughly, and attending more
closely to the history of communication technologies as well as the history
of qualitative inquiry. The targets of
research continue to follow shifts in technological development. Herring (2004) aptly notes that researchers
have tended to follow novelty; researchers quickly flock to each new
technology. Research in the 1980s
tended to focus on the use and impact of computers, email, and networking in
the workplace (overviewed well by Sproull & Kiesler, 1991). In
the 1990s, research waves move progressively through various forms of CMC,
such as Email, Usenet, MUDs and MOOs,
the World Wide Web, IM (Instant Messaging), SMS (Short Messaging Service via
mobile telephone), and Blogs. Various social interaction practices and social
structures received empirical attention over the past decade: Flaming and other forms of emotionally
charged or violent acts (e.g., Dery, 1994; Dibble,
1993; MacKinnon, 1998); the use of emoticons to compensate for the absence of
nonverbals (Witmer & Katzman,
1998); the social construction of virtual communities via mailing lists
(e.g., Baym, 1995; Bromseth, 2002; Sveningsson, 2001; Rheingold, 1993), MUDs
or MOOs (e.g., Kendall, 1998; Reid, 1995) or
websites (Johnson, 2003); the intersection of technology and identity (e.g.,
Lupton, 1995; Markham, 1998; Senft & Horn,
1996; Sondheim, 1996; Stone, 1996; Turkle, 1995);
sexuality (e.g., Kiesler, 1997; Waskul,
Douglass, & Edgley, 2000); gender and
participation in CMC (e.g., Herring, 1993); and race (Kolko,
Nakamura, & Rodman, 2000).
Ethnographically informed studies have focused on online groups (e.g.,
Baym, 1995; Eichhorn, 2002; Kendall, 1998; Orgad, 2003; Reid, 1995); use of Internet in traditional,
physically based cultures (e.g., Miller & Slater, 2000); cultural
formation around particular topics (e.g., Hine,
2000); and sensemaking in specialized environments such as virtual work teams
(e.g., Shane, 2001). Multiple anthologies offered accounts of
cyberculture (E.g., High Noon on the Electronic Frontier (1996); the
Cybercultures Reader (2000)). Utilizing both pop culture and academic
accounts, these texts provide a useful overview of the 1990s viewpoints about
computer-mediated communication and cultural practice. Few resources existed during the 1990s to
specifically guide qualitative researchers.
Although researchers offered context-specific discussions of research
methods (represented well in Internet Research, edited by Jones,
1999), a comprehensive treatment did not appear until 2000, when Mann &
Stewart’s volume provided principles and practices for conducting qualitative
inquiry using Internet communication as a tool of research. As research in this evolving field grows more
refined, the conceptualization of computer-mediated communication has shifted
from sweeping universalized encapsulations to more specific, context-based
definitions. As well, some have noted
a move from exaggerated to mundane accounts.
A recent article (Herring, 2004) entitled Slouching toward the
ordinary notes the trend to minimize the impact of new communication
technologies on identity, subjectivity, and social practices and
structures. In this same vein,
ethnographic inquiry appears to be shifting from the study of online-only
environments and virtual identity to the intersection of computer-mediated
communication with everyday life.
Scholars are now calling for increased attention to the multiple uses
and definitions of “internet” in context, as well as increased attention to
how the online and offline intersect (Baym, 2003; Orgad,
2003). Overtly political analyses of computer mediated
communication are diverse in scope and range.
I mention just two areas:
research in developing countries and research interrogating the role
of the researcher. Work exploring the
use of internet technologies in developing countries is important and
increasing. Kolko
conducted in-depth interviews in Research exploring the researcher’s role in
internet studies is also expanding: My own work was acknowledged as an
explicitly reflexive discussion of the researcher’s role in internet
ethnography (1998). Later works also
discuss directly the ethical and political stance of the researcher and the
relationship between researcher and participants (e.g., Ryen,
2002). Bromseth
(2002; 2003) discusses in depth the ethical dilemmas of collecting data in
groups where people are reluctant to be studied. Gajjala (2002)
explores her own study of a group wherein the members were overtly and
actively resistant to her intent as a researcher. Along different lines, Eichhorn’s
study of a virtual group (2001) astutely addresses the paradox of using
offline interviews to understand online subjectivities. Orgad’s work
(2002) illustrates the opposite paradox:
using only online interviews with women in a virtual support group to
understand how these women make sense of their illness. In both cases, these researchers recognized
during the course of their research that giving voice to the participants
meant selecting the medium based on what was most appropriate for the
participants, not the researcher. A final note about the shifting trends in
qualitative research over the past decade of Internet studies. Many studies have been labeled
‘ethnography’ when the more appropriate term would be interview study, case
study, phenomenology, grounded theory, narrative analysis, biography or life
history, and so forth. ‘Ethnography’
seems to be a term that is applied by scholars who do not know what else to
call their work or, in my case (1998), by scholars whose study of new forms
of ethnography broadens the umbrella of what can be considered
‘ethnography.’ Closely related, the
quality of work in Internet studies from an ethnographer’s or qualitative
methodologist’s perspective has varied widely; some scholars come to the field
of inquiry having been trained in qualitative methods, while others have
topic- or technology-specific expertise or interest but no familiarity or
training in the diversity of qualitative approaches (Mann, 2002). Critical Junctures in
research design and process The
idea of studying the Internet or using Internet technologies to facilitate
qualitative research is beguiling: A
researcher’s reach is potentially global, data collection is economical, and
transcribing is no more difficult than cutting and pasting. But in the virtual field, as one interacts
with anonymous participants, tracks disjointed, non-linear, multiple
participant conversations, and analyzes hundreds of screens worth of cultural
texts, one can begin to feel like the Internet might cause more headaches
than it cures. Deceptive in its
apparent simplicity, qualitative inquiry in this environment requires careful
attention to the traditional means by which social life is interpreted and
the adjustments that must be made to give value to the online experience and
internal consistency to one’s methods.
The absence of visual information about the participant functions more
paradoxically than one might realize.
Socio-economic markers such as body type, gender, race, and class are
used consciously or unconsciously by researchers to make sense of
participants in physical settings.
Online, these frames are still used but without visual information,
they function invisibly. This warrants
close examination, both to consider how this happens and to explore how the
researcher’s default premises and unconscious choices can influence the shape
of the participant and the reality of the outcome. This complexity of knowing anything
certain about the other is paradoxical, yet to acknowledge the uncertainty or
even impossibility of knowing Other is to risk paralysis in the research
process, loss of authority in the presentation of research, and diminishment
of one’s academic role as observer/interpreter/archivist of social life. How, then, does one proceed? “With caution” is a trite yet reasonable
response which calls for sensitivity to the context, interrogation of one’s
own presumptions, and flexible adaptation to a new era in social research,
one in which we recognize the limitations bred by our traditional five senses
and take the risks necessary to reconsider how and why we seek and create
knowledge. Proceeding thus is a
political move. It does not retreat
from understanding Other on the grounds that the researcher cannot know
anything except his or her own experiences.
It also does not rest the on the laurels of traditional methods,
trying to shore up ways of knowing that are crumbling before our eyes as
digital and convergent media saturate cultural practices and forms. It faces the complexity and interrogates
the way we analyze people for purposes of academic inquiry. If one examines deeply the way new
communication technologies influence the research project, one is likely to
stumble into issues which question the fundamental reasons for doing research
in the first place. Allowing oneself
to explore those issues can vitally contribute to the creation of reflexive
and socially responsible research practice. At several junctures during the
research project we have the opportunity and responsibility to reflexively
interrogate our roles, methods, ethical stances, and interpretations. When studying computer-mediated
environments, this need is intensified because the traditional frames of
reference we use to guide our premises and procedures are entrenched in
physical foundations and modernist ontologies. Questions one might address include: § What
can we say we know about the Other when self, other, and the context may be
constructed solely through the exchange of messages? § In
social situations derived from discursive interaction, is it possible to
simply observe? Is it desirable? § How
does the researcher’s participation in the medium affect the identity of the
participant and the shape of the culture?
§ How
can one balance the traditional scientific impulse to uncover the “real”
while interacting with people who may or may not have any correspondence to
their physical counterparts? § In
what ways do one’s research traditions delimit and limit the possibilities
for sensemaking in environments which are not overtly physical, visual, and
aural? Whether
or not the researcher pays attention to them, the issues raised by these
questions operate throughout any ethnographically based project. They identify logistic challenges but also
display problematic working assumptions that must be addressed. Reflexive research practice requires a
constant disruption of the seemingly placid surface of inquiry. Stopping to identify critical decision
junctures and reflect on the consequences of specific actions constitutes an
honest presence in the research process and active engagement in the ethical
grounding of one’s inquiry.[2]
Defining the boundaries of the field. Determining what constitutes data. Interpreting the other as text. Using embodied sensibilities to
interpret textuality. Representing other ethically in
research reports. Each
of these categories identifies a critical decision juncture within the
research project. Neither exhaustive
nor separate, these categories can be used as examples to help one think
through some of the decisions made during the course of a study which have
meaningful consequences for the identity of the participants, the
representation of self and other in research reporting, and the shape of the
body of scientific knowledge built on multiple ethnographically informed
studies. The actual questions one
might ask are particular to the researcher and the project, as variable as
one’s worldviews and methodological approaches. Defining
the boundaries of the field Drawing
boundaries around the research context, or “identifying the field” involves a
series of decisions that both presuppose and reveal the researcher’s
underlying ontological and epistemological assumptions. Obviously, reflecting on our own biases is
not just useful but ethically necessary, even if our academic training did
not identify the necessity for such reflection. When studying physically based cultures,
the location of the field is typically predetermined, so the logistical
challenges lie in gaining access and building rapport with informants. For the Internet ethnographer, the process
of locating and defining sensible boundaries of the field can be convoluted
and elusive. Because the Internet is geographically
dispersed, the researcher has the option to disregard location and distance
to communicate instantaneously and inexpensively with people. Logistically, the distance-collapsing
capacity of the Internet allows the researcher to connect to participants
around the globe. The researcher can include
people previously unavailable for study.
This not only increases the pool of participants but also provides the
potential for cross-cultural comparisons that were not readily available
previously for practical and financial reasons. In a world where potential participants are
only a keyboard click and fibre optic or wireless
connection away, distance become almost meaningless as a pragmatic
consideration in research design; the Internet serves as an extension of the
researcher’s and participant’s bodies.
Research can be designed around questions of interaction and social
behavior unbound from the restrictions of proximity or geography. Participants can be selected on the basis
of their appropriate fit within the research questions rather than their
physical location or convenience to the researcher. From geographic to
discursive boundaries As we shift from geographic to
computer-mediated spaces we are shifting focus from place to interaction,
from location to locomotion ( Seemingly mundane decisions become
crucial criteria that are used, consciously or not, to create boundaries
around the field of inquiry. Boundary
markers are underwritten by the researcher’s choice about how to find data
sites, which search engine to use to sample, whom to interact with, what to
say in interaction with participants, what language to speak, when to seek
and conduct interviews (including both time of day and considering timezones) and so forth.
Computer-mediated cultural contexts are shifting contexts. Their discursive construction occurs in
global as well as local patterns.
Membership can be transient.
This becomes more meaningful when one realizes the boundary-forming
work that is being accomplished when one contributes messages to a group,
defines the boundaries of a cultural phenomenon through one’s own surfing
choices, and sifts or funnels the data set by using a particular search
engine or set of databases. Each
action taken by the research in this vast information sphere contributes
directly to the construction of the structures that eventually get labeled
“field” or “data.” Indeed, the global potential of this
medium is often conflated with global reach, an achievement that relies on
global access ( Participation in the
discursive construction of the field As I have noted previously ( By the very nature of their actions and
interactions, researchers in any cultural environment are involved in the
construction of what becomes the object of analysis. This is highlighted in
technologically-mediated environments because both the production and
consumption of communication can be global, non-sequential, fragmented,
disembodied, and decentered. In contexts where the boundaries of self,
other, and social world are created and sustained solely through the exchange
of information, being is therefore relational and dialectic. Social constructions are less connected to
their physical properties. Boundaries
are not so much determined by “location” as they are by “interaction.” The boundaries of the field become more
a matter of choice than in physically located spaces. Researchers are more obviously participative. Addressing a seemingly simple question of
“should I participate or observe” then, gives rise to an entirely more
complicated set of issues that shape the research design and complicate our
concepts of how media function socially. The seemingly simple act of choosing
a particular community of websites creates an audience that previously did
not exist and indicates to the larger academic community that this context is
meaningful. Thus, choice of field
becomes a politically charged process because of the inherent ethicality of
one’s decisions. Ethnography that ignores these issue
risks remains at the edges of the cultural context and more importantly,
remains mired in the now much critiqued notion that researcher observes but
does not interfere with or influence that which is studied. Moreover, the decisions that a researcher
makes at this level directly influence the way the researcher later
represents the context and the participants, which ultimately impacts our
academic conversations of and knowledge about computer mediated communication
environments. These are issues laden
with ethical responsibility, yet the questions themselves appear to be so
straightforward they are often only addressed as simple logistics problems. This discussion necessarily takes us
forward to later stages of the research process. The effort or unconscious decision to
absent oneself from the field will not remove the researcher from the process
and product. Thinking ahead to the
outcome of inquiry—the research report—one must acknowledge that the
interpretation of culture will change depending on the form of the telling.
Interpretative focus and the nature of the “findings” shift with the passage
of time, the venue for publication, the credibility of the author or notoriety
of the subject, and innumerable other factors. Frankly, whether or not the researcher
participates or simply observes, the construction of the research report will
present a particular reality of the object of analysis that is influenced by
the identity and participation of the researcher. It may be more productive to acknowledge
one’s participative role early, so that every aspect of the research design
can effectively incorporate the researcher’s presence in the construction of
the field under study. As Internet
Studies evolves as an interdisciplinary field of inquiry, further research
depth and credibility will be gained through realistic and contemporary
conceptualizations of the ways in which the researcher, reader, and object of
analysis intersect. Determining
what constitutes data A
researcher’s representation of others is inextricably bound up with the way
data is collected and distinguished as meaningful versus meaningless. Computer mediated communication contexts
complicate the researcher’s decisions, not only because the contexts are
constructed interactively, comprised of mostly disembodied participants, or
because the researcher has little access to typical sensemaking devices used
to identify and collect data. The
researcher’s decisions are further complicated because we are always and
constantly struck with stimuli in any research environment, stimuli that must
be filtered in and out in order to create sensible categories for
interpretation. Interacting in
text-only online environments diminishes the most prominent of our senses:
vision. CMC separates more obviously
the wholeness of a person’s being into component parts; that which was
previously made sense of as a whole is consequently made sense of at
different points of time using different combinations of senses. This feature of technology promotes highly
focused and divided attention on the content, the producer, the carrier, and
the meaning of discursive activity in context. Even in more overtly visual research
environments, where the researcher may have access to photos, webcams, websites, hyperlink behavior, and blogs, the issue is not resolved because traditional
research training is designed for physically co-present environments. Methodologically, one must reflect
carefully on what collected information is considered as “data.” Just as interaction constructs and reflects
the shape of the phenomena being studied, interaction also delineates the
being doing the research in the field.
Obviously, we cannot pay attention to everything--our analytical lens
is limited by what we are drawn to, what we are trained to attend to, and
what we want to find. Borrowing from
Goffman (1967), our understanding is determined as much by our own frames of
reference as the frames supplied by the context. Our selection of data and rejection of
non-data presents a critical juncture within which to interrogate the
possible consequences of our choices on the representation of others through
our research. An example of online discourse from
prior research ( Initially archiving Matthew’s
interview, I included the entire log of the conversation. As I began the analysis process, I removed
extraneous, repetitive, or system-specific commands in order to minimize
distractions. The following sample is
from this latter phase, where the commands are removed. From this log, I conducted the initial
analysis of data:
After
conducting initial coding and analysis, I found that I was struggling with
this interview. I returned to the
original transcript and realized I had made an error in my delineation of
“meaningful” from “nonessential” data.
The following excerpt illustrates what I saw when I returned to the
original interview (the pieces I had removed are underlined):
My
interpretation shifted as I realized the extent to which Matthew made certain
to include his embodied activities in the conversation. Regardless of the interpretation one elects
to make about these underlined enactments (Matthew is hungry, bored,
creative, using conventions learned in culture), the fact remains that the
data is different from one transcript to the next. One can elect to bracket or set aside
the form and focus only on the content. This decision would be guided
by the premise that the meaning of one’s utterances is only understood in
context and therefore, the medium is less important than the content. On the other hand, to ignore the form in
this interview could also be seen as a poor choice, given the well founded
premise that nonverbal behaviors function discursively in the presentation of
self, negotiation of identity, and eventual symbolic construction of culture.
In this case, my analysis would suffer without the inclusion of Matthew’s
delineation of his embodied activities. One’s choice in this situation should
be guided by the research questions or the overall goal of research, which in
this case was to explore how people experience the Internet and how their
identities are presented and negotiated. Yet, this edict is laden with
ambiguity when put into practice.
Multiple dilemmas present themselves: How much does text
represent the reality of the person? Put more personally, how much
would I want to be bound by what I wrote at any particular time? To
what extent does or should the researcher include spelling or typing ability
as meaningful information in the understanding of identity or culture? How much are my own preconceptions and
stereotypes influencing how I elect to categorize data from non-data? One might wonder whether or not I ever
asked Matthew to participate in the decision about what constituted “data,”
as this would seem a relatively easy way to answer some of the questions
asked above. What would Matthew
categorize as meaningful data from unessential non-data? On the other hand, why and under what
circumstances would I want Matthew to determine what ought to be analyzed and
what ought to be ignored? These questions are important in that
they directly shape what is examined by the researcher. This is not an unfamiliar point, as it
raises the importance of interrogating the researcher’s role in writing
culture (Clifford and Marcus, 1986).
In this case (and any, I would suggest), while the analysis may indeed
emerge from the data, the researcher determines a priori what constitutes
data in the first place, making this decision point a crucial reflection
point. Interpreting
the other through their text As
one addresses these issues and shifts from data collection to analysis,
another critical juncture arises, sponsored by the following question: To what extent is the Other defined by his
or her texts? When the participant,
researcher and context are nothing but text and everything beyond mere
language, our perceptual filters must be adjusted to accommodate complexities
of human expression. Discursive
practices are the heart of our enterprise as ethnographic researchers. When the discourse is limited to the
exchange of texts, one might think that the methods of analysis are likewise
limited to what is seen in the text, but this is not the case. Rather, an array of interpretive tools are
used to make sense of these texts and it becomes a worthwhile task to reflect
on some of the more hidden or unacknowledged analytical methods being used to
interpret the Other. The
following three examples usefully illustrate the extent to which participants
can be judged in multiple ways by the form of their texts. The samples of discourse in these examples
represent well the writing tendencies of three participants: Sheol, sherie, and dominOH!. <Sheol> I am intrested
in talking to:) Could you be more spesific
about what questions you will ask? Just let me know when you want to
talk, and I will try to accomidate! :) <Sheol> I became a very popular (I know that
sounds conseeded) figuar
on the line I called home. I am ruled by the right side of my brain so
I liked the diea of being that personality. In
this interview with Sheol, it was impossible to
bracket the spelling, use of graphic accents, tag lines, and so forth. From the beginning, I had been determined
to conduct systematic analyses that remained close to the text. I was using a blend of content-oriented
analytical tools to code, thematize, and make sense
of the interactions with participants.
Reflecting on my inability to ignore the form in my analysis of
content jarred me out of the false stability granted by method-specific
procedures and caused me to identify some of the ways I was putting Sheol into categories without noticing what I was
doing. For example, very early on, I
categorized Sheol as female because a gendered
language style was very evident in tags, qualifiers, expressions of emotion,
and heavy use of graphic accents (Sheol turned out
to be male). Sheol
was also: Young (spelling was
phonetic, attention to language misuse was not at all evident); Perhaps not
very intelligent (multiple spelling errors, unreadable messages, apparent
lack of ability to be a real hacker); and, of course, Caucasian (default
characteristic because of mainstream cultural assumptions about use of the
Internet as well as the tendency to make the online other look more like the
self). Additionally and solely based on my own frame of reference, Sheol was heterosexual, middle class, and American. In a different study, a participant
called DominOH! also used phonetic spelling, but in
a different way: <DominOH!> Sumtymz i am lost in my online identiteez…well,
the aktuel problem?
i
feel more ‘found’ in my online selvvz…kicky,
spun out, reeler than real. More atooned to
the energee and more atooned
to those i’m talking with..... <DominOH!> .....so much fun 2 play......YOU, and
EVERYONE else, kannot reely
no mee. And
y do you feeeeel that you need 2?! So, online I’m a nerdy college professor
with a quirky sense of humor, or I’m a professhunal athlete with a career ending injuree, and sumtymz i’m handsum,
or i’m beauteous…and if peepole
wanna hang with mee, i’m alwaze up for play. In
my conversations with this persona, I found it easier to bracket the
misspellings because they appeared obvious and deliberate. DominOH! seemed
to revel in the ability to remain elusive during our various interactions. DominOH!’s
discourse was marked with aggressive and challenging statements. I was cautious with this participant to not
make assumptions about gender but found myself categorizing DominOH! as male, young, well-educated, and
Caucasian. As the researcher, I have numerous
choices regarding the interpretation of these interviews. My choices
will build cultural knowledge about Sheol and DominOH! as individuals and about how people interact in
cyberspace. In interpretive inquiry,
the integrity of one’s interpretation is tied directly to reflexivity. Frequently, though, reflexivity happens after
the analysis is in progress or the project is completed. I mentally attached a number of social
labels to both these participants during the course of our conversations and
long after, as I was interpreting the discourse. Some of the labels I did not recognize
until others pointed them out. The
importance is not in the accuracy of the labels, but in the type of evidence
used to derive the category. Without
reflection, I initially gave a negative attribution to Sheol’s
phonetic spelling (deficient abilities) while giving a positive attribution
to DominOH!’s (cleverness). Without reflection, I categorized Sheol as female and DominOH! as
male, based solely on their use of accommodating or aggressive language. This example illustrates that one’s
interpretation is founded in the text but simultaneously not limited to the
text. While systematic procedures of
analysis are vital tools for the social scientist, they are not failsafe if
followed to the letter. Procedures can
actually blind one to the actual interpretive processes occurring. In Internet-based environments, the
existence of the online persona being studied is often encapsulated by their
pixels on a computer screen. The choices made to attend to, ignore, or
edit these pixels has real consequences for the persons whose manifestations
are being altered beyond and outside their control. if a subject types
solely in lowercase and uses nonstandard.grammatical.conventions
the resirchurs correction of *errors* may
inappropriately ignore and thus misrepresent a participant’s deliberate
presentation of self. ;-) if someone spells atroshiously
or uniQueLY and the researcher corrects it in the
research report for readAbility, alteration of a
person’s desired online identity may be the price of smooth reading (Markham,
2003a, 2003b). On the other hand, Sheol
may be working with a sticky keyboard, ignoring the errors in the interest of
speed, or multi-tasking such that he is not devoted fully to our
interaction. DominOH!
may be more comfortable with phonetic spelling. Maybe she was aggressive in response to
something I had said early on.
Certainly, to make the interpretive task both easier and more grounded
in the participant’s experience, one could ask the participants to clarify
their own writing tendencies. One
could also gather additional demographic information. My point, however, is not to articulate how
to make the interpretations more accurate or truthful, but to identify one of
many moments in the research project when the researcher faces, consciously
or not, certain decisions about what to include as part of the interpretive
consideration, only some of which can be identified or controlled. To make this task more difficult, the
most ethically sensitive approach to analysis is complicated—and impeded—by
academic conventions and training.
Most social science approaches teach the researcher to distill the
complexity of human experience into discrete variables that are easily
measured. Interpretive methods seek to
ease these restrictions but involve ways of knowing that continually strive
to simplify rather than complexify human
experience. To shift the gaze from the
subject of research to the gaze itself is one step in the evolution of human
sciences. To stop there, however, is
to risk losing sight of the larger goals of inquiry. Rather than seeking to describe or reflect
reality, researchers must consider the political act of promoting,
activating, or engendering realities. The
search for authenticity[3] Particularly
notable in disembodied research environments, the researcher’s body continues
to be privileged as the site of experience, the best measure of authenticity,
and the residence of knowledge. This
is sensible, literally, because we make sense of our world through our eyes,
ears, noses, mouths, and sense of touch.
We abstract our embodied knowledge to convey it through logic,
language, and print, but as Ackerman (1995) notes, our primary level of
understanding remains firmly entwined with our senses. “There is no way in which to understand
the world without first detecting it through the radar-net of our senses. . .
. The senses . . . tear reality apart
into vibrant morsels and reassemble them into a meaningful pattern. . .
. Reasoning we call it, as if it were
a mental spice” (pp. xv-xvii). The implications of this are
significant in scientific research; in most traditions, the interpretive act
is characterized as an analytical, logical, mental procedure. Separated from the body in theory, the
embodied practice of interpretation lingers.
Online, this underlying disjuncture is highlighted precisely because
the body of the participant is notably absent. Searching for the body
behind the text The question often asked about
participants in online contexts is “Who are they, really?” By this, one
often means, who are they, as I can see, verify, and know them in a
body? From students, reviewers, and publishers, I have heard the suggestion
many times: “You should have
interviewed the participants offline as well as online. Then, you would have a better idea of who
they are.” Shifting one’s perspective
slightly, one might ask questions that get at the underlying issues: How much
do we rely on our bodies and the bodies of participants to establish presence
and know other? Is this reliance warranted or desirable? Will our
picture of other, in person, make our understanding of them more whole?
More directly: Does the embodiment of a participant gauge their
authenticity? The answers depend not only on the
question one is seeking to address but also on the researcher’s underlying
epistemological assumptions. If one is simply using the Internet as a
tool to expand one’s reach to participants and interviewing them online is
merely a convenience, one should consider the extent to which people can and
do express themselves well, truly, or fully in text. But if one is
studying Internet contexts as cultural formations or social interaction in computer
mediated communication contexts, the inclusion of embodied ways of knowing
may be unwarranted and even counterproductive. In chat rooms, on mobile phones,
through personal websites, and other media, identity is produced and consumed
in a form abstracted from actual presence.
Cultural understanding is literally constructed discursively and
interactively. We know from both popular press and scholarly studies
that many people seek interaction and community on the Internet because it
provides the perceived means to escape the confines of embodied social
markers to engage in what many refer to as a “meeting of the minds.” Whether or not this is truly possible (and
some have argued (e.g., Ess, 2003; Kolko, Nakamura, & Rodman, 2000) that it is not), a
user’s desire to present and be perceived as a confluence of texts without
body might best be read by researchers as a request for us to acknowledge
text as ample and sufficient evidence of being and to study it as such
(Markham, 2003a, 2003c). Yet social scientists persist in
seeking the authentic by privileging the concept of the body. The desire to add validity to findings
often results in research design that holds up the textual representation of
the participants next to their physical personae. The goal is to see the extent to which the
images match. Researchers deciding to
interview participants both online and f2f (face to face) may claim that
their efforts will add authenticity to their interpretation--by adding
paralinguistic or nonverbal cues to the words people speak—and thereby add
more credibility to their findings (Markham, 2003a). For good biologically-based reasons,
researchers rely on and trust their traditional senses of sight, smell,
touch, taste and hearing to provide verification of concrete reality. We are conditioned to rely particularly on
our visual sensibilities: “Seventy percent of the body’s sense receptors
cluster in the eyes, and it is mainly through seeing the world that we appraise
and understand it” (Ackerman, p. 230).
Ecologist and philosopher David Abram adds that perception is a
reciprocity between the body and the entities that surround it. Considering Merleu-Ponty’s
idea that perception itself is embodied, Abram notes that “[Perception] is a
sort of silent conversation that I carry on with things, a continuous
dialogue that unfolds far below my verbal awareness” (1997, p. 52). Although “we conceptually mobilize or
objectify the phenomenon . . . by mentally absenting ourselves from this
relation” (Abram, 1997, p. 56), our understanding of the world is
sensual. While it makes sense that
researchers use embodied sensibilities, this is not mentioned much, if at
all, in methods textbooks. It
therefore becomes a critical juncture to address in a very conscious manner. Removing the researcher’s bod In essentially disembodied
relationships and cultures, one must wonder if the intrusion of certain
embodied sensemaking faculties bleeds integrity from the project of knowing
the other in context. Yet, as
mentioned above, perception always involves embodiment, and this cannot be
set aside in the context of studying life online. Hence, a paradox emerges that may not be
overcome but should be considered, acknowledged, or accounted for in the
research design or research report. Irony follows, however, when one notes
the marked absence of the researcher’s own embodiment in many studies of
text-based cultural contexts. Although
a researcher may give his or her participants’ bodied forms and make sense of
their identities through his or her own body, this sensibility is rarely
noted in the published paper.
Considerable privilege is given to the researcher to make his or her
own embodiment a choice or even a non-issue while simultaneously questioning
the authenticity of the participants’ choices regarding their own
embodiment. Ethically as well as
epistemologically, it is vital to reflect carefully on the extent to which
the research design privileges the researcher at the expense of both
understanding the other and operating with a keen awareness of the context
(Markham, 2003a, p. 152). The online persona may be much more
fluid and changeable than we imagine as we catch them in particular moments
or only a fraction of the virtual venues they populate. Anonymity in
text based environments gives one more choices and control in the
presentation of self, whether or not the presentation is perceived as
intended. Understanding the potential for flexible, ad hoc negotiation
of identity in a text-based social space may foster another critical juncture
at which the researcher can ask an intriguing set of questions about the
representation of other: As
researchers and members of various communities and cultures, what do we use
to construct a sense of who the Other really is?" “In what
ways do our methods of comprehending life as interwoven with new
communication technologies ignore, deny, or validate shifting constructions
of identity and social world?” Interpreting within
socio-economic comfort zones It makes sense that researchers
visualize their participants even in non-visual text-based media. Yet,
it is not only the visual bias that must be critically analyzed by
researchers, but also the imagination with which one visualizes the
participant. Pioneers on the research
frontier of online ethnography continually juxtapose embodiment with other
modes of presentation and knowing. When we rely on our embodied
sensibilities of knowing, we are not necessarily getting a better or more
“accurate” picture of the subjects of our studies; we may be simply
reflecting our own comfort zones of research. Critical reflection on
the product of our gaze can reveal some of these comfort zones for
introspection and interrogation.
Researchers should be wary of the tendency to perceive the world in
familiar, close-to-home categories.
What do the participants look like in the mind’s eye? How likely is the researcher to give the
participant an ethnic category different from his or her own? What information is used to make judgments
about the embodied person behind the screen?
Typing speed, spelling and grammar
usage, choice of (nick)name; linear or fragmented progression of ideas: These all influence the way a participant
is understood by the researcher. As
the researcher visually appraises the discursive practices of the
participants, the form wafts through the sensemaking like an invisible but
compelling scent on the breeze.
Whether one notices that the text is idiosyncratic or not, either in
its error or uniqueness or blandness or precision, the form influences
meaning and helps give a bodied shape to the participant. Form composes new stereotypes that must be
acknowledged and interrogated. As researchers, we carry our own
predilections concerning race, gender, and bodied appearance of virtual
participants. For no obvious reasons,
I identified the participant mentioned above, Sheol,
as white, female, heterosexual, young, and average in body weight and
height. After about two hours of the
interview, Sheol mentioned “girlfriend,” and I recognized
that I had made an invisible (but obviously in operation) assumption that she
was heterosexual. Forced to reconcile
the contradiction between my a priori assumption and the use of the word
“girlfriend,” I began to look for clues of gender I must have missed
earlier. I also began to wonder at my
invisible use of sexuality and gender as categories. I did not reflect on the fact that I
was giving Sheol a body in my mind until this
disjuncture occurred and I realized the body in my mind no longer fit the
body being presented by the participant.
To note, Sheol was simply chatting with me,
not presenting a body in any deliberate fashion. I had given shape to the person. A few minutes later, when Sheol referred to himself as a male, I realized she was
not a lesbian but that ‘he’ had a ‘girlfriend.’ I had made yet another blunder. The form of the message had led me to an
initial assumption that Sheol was female. The name, if read at a very surface level,
hinted that Sheol was female (here, “Sheol” is a double-pseudonym but the original name was
similar in that if read quickly, part of the spelling could be mistaken as an
obviously female name or marker, like “Susanerd” or
“21She132”). I also knew from previous
research that women tend to use more tag lines, offer more caveats, and
augment their texts with more emoticons and punctuation. Recent inquiry of race in cyberspace
contends that users transform online others into images of themselves but
that these images are limited by media representations of identity, so that
most visualizations will conform to mass media images of beauty, race,
gender, ethnicity, and size (Nakamura, 1995).
What impact does this have for qualitative researchers conducting
ethnographically informed research in anonymous or virtual
environments? In teaching computer mediated courses,
my assumptions turn my students white and nondescript. If they use an interesting name, I find
myself trying to find a body that suits what I perceive the name implies
about the appearance of their persona.
When I reflect on my visual images, I realize that even though race is
supposedly absent from the research lens, it becomes a category which
defaults to “white” (Nakamura, 2003). My experience is not
atypical. It illustrates how much we rely on and use our own parameters
to categories others into something we can comfortably address.
Scholarly discussion of race and the Internet is growing, particularly
concerning how the Internet has been created and perceived naively as a raceless space (Kendall,
1998; Kolko, Nakamura,
& Rodman, 2000; Poster, 1998).
These discussions will help researchers better reflect on the spaces studied
as well as the assumptions made during the collection and interpretation
phases of the project. Again, traditional academic training
complicates the issues of embodiment for researchers in that this training
seeks to make the researcher invisible.
Traditional academic training encourages the researcher to focus on
the theory and method as the locus of control in the study. Good research design, in the scientific
tradition, eliminates bias, allows the method to strictly guide the findings,
and ignores non-scientific measures such as hunches. The researcher’s senses should be removed
from the analysis of data and researcher’s voice should be removed from the
final report and the. This training
creates habits—even among strongly resistant researchers—to ignore or deny
the impact of one’s conscious or unconscious embodied sensibilities on the
research outcome. It is difficult even
in qualitative research to peel back one’s own complicated layers of
interpretation. Considering methods as ethics As
mentioned early in this article, any method decision is an ethics
decision. The political potential and
consequences of our research should not be underestimated. Every choice we make about how to represent
the self, participants, and the cultural context under study contributes to
how these are understood, framed, and responded to by readers, future
students, policy makers, and the like.
The process of studying culture is one
of comprehension, encapsulation and control.
To say otherwise is to deny our impulses and roles as scholars and
scientists. At a very basic level, we
go there to learn something about Other and—when we think we have something
figured out, to decide how to tell others what we think we know. To accomplish this goal, we must stop for a
moment the flood of experience, extract a sample of it for inspection, and
re-present it in academic terms with no small degree of abstraction. The
researcher is afforded a tremendous degree of control in representing the
realities of the people and contexts under study. This control need not be characterized in a
completely negative fashion, as we could also consider the image of a möbius strip, where seemingly opposing sides are
eventually realized as part of the same path.
Our capacity to represent cultural knowledge is a great responsibility,
with many traps and difficulties. But
it is also a gift, well-earned through education, well-honed through
experience, and well-intended through ethical reflexivity. Editing choices Consider the way research reports
present, frame, and embody the people being studied: A person’s very being
has the potential to be literally reconfigured when edited by the researcher
and put into a context of a research account rather than left in the context
of experience. This dilemma does not apply only to the
study of virtual environments, but any study of human behavior, of
course. But computer-mediated
environments seem to highlight this dilemma of research reporting because
it’s so clear that text can be the primary, if not sole means of producing
and negotiating self, other, body, and culture. Common practices of editing are rarely
questioned. What happens when we
transform the participant’s utterances from disjunctive sentence fragments to
smooth paragraphs? How are we
presenting the social reality of these spaces when we correct grammar,
spelling, and punctuation? How might
we be changing their identities when we transform the appearance of their
fonts to meet the acceptable standards for various publishing venues? Study participants can appear to be as
smooth as movie characters after the writer has cleaned up everyday
talk. Of course, the writer must make
the report readable, but this need must be balanced with what is possibly
silenced in this process. Online, this
project takes a somewhat different form than in physically-based research
contexts. Highly disjunctive online
conversations get reproduced as tidy exchanges of messages. A conversation developing over the course
of six months can appear as a single paragraph in the written report. Deliberate fragmentation of ideas can be
spliced into linear logic. Key to the
ethical representation of the participant is sensitivity to the context and
the individual. Certain editing
choices may not alter the meaning of the utterances, interaction or identity
of the textual being embodied through these utterances. Other editing choices can function to
devalue, ignore, or silence a fundamental aspect of this persona ( On the other side of the coin, when
presenting dialogue with participants, how many writers present a version of
reality wherein they themselves talk and think in a hyper-organized
fashion? Researchers are not likely to
do this deliberately. Rather, the
habit is an ingrained part of our training; it goes along with other
practices, such as using passive voice and third person in the traditional
academic paper. In the search for
understanding the discursive construction of reality in computer-mediated
environments, overediting may be misleading and
limiting. The reader may have
difficulty reading non-linear, disjunctive, or seriously misspelled examples
of dialogue, but just like the visual elements of a personal website, these
features of discourse illustrate vividly how it is experienced. Generally speaking, as soon as an
interaction occurs, the study of it becomes an abstraction. This is a fact of research. Even so, simplification or dismissal of the
challenge of representation is not warranted. The task is to design research
which allows human subjects to retain their autonomy and identity—whether or
not their uniqueness is intentional or unintentional ( In whose interests? Shifting from ideas about re-presenting
participants to ideas about advocacy, the political aspects of research
become more visible. The question of
advocacy can be asked in many ways:
“Whose interests does the research serve?” “Why am I doing this research anyway?” “What groups need speaking for?” “How can my analysis help someone?” “How can my writing and publishing give
voice to those who might remain otherwise silent?” These are not simply political or
ethical questions. These are methods
questions that must be embedded in design, in that they impact directly the
way information is collected and analyzed and how research findings are
written and distributed. Yet questions
such as these are not typically included in research methods textbooks as a
part of the primary methodological discussion. If included at all, these questions are
relegated to a separate unit or chapter entitled “Ethics” or separated from
the main text, along with other special, non-typical considerations. Even if one’s research goals do not
include serving as an advocate for participants, I suggest that not only will
research design be more ethically grounded and reflexive but also the results
will have more integrity if these questions are considered throughout the
course of the study. They serve as important
reminders that researchers often take more than they give, that the
researcher’s choices are always privileged, and that even when wanting to
give voice to participants, the researcher can unintentionally end up as the
hidden ventriloquist, speaking for, rather than with, others (Fine, et al,
2000). Ethics and Institutional
Review Boards Ethical guidelines for internet
research vary sharply across disciplines and countries, depending on the
premises and assumptions used to develop the criteria from which actions are
judged as ethical or not. In this
section, I’ve chosen to outline the features of Internet interaction that
give rise to ethical controversies and to sketch the major distinctions
between the ‘utilitarian’ (predominant in the United States) and the
‘deontological’ or ‘communitarian’ stances (predominant in certain parts of
the EU, particularly Nordic countries).
This discussion is intended to give researchers alternative ways of
thinking about projects, so that decisions are made not just based on what is
legally required but also on what constitutes the right course of action in
particular research and social contexts.
For Internet researchers, ethical
challenges and controversy arise in the following circumstances: § Some
users perceive publicly accessible discourse sites as private. § Some
users have a writing style that is readily identifiable in their online
community, so that the researcher’s use of a pseudonym does not guarantee
anonymity. § Online
discussion sites can be highly transient.
Researchers gaining access permission in June may not be studying the
same population in July. § Search
engines are often capable of finding statements used in research report,
making anonymity in certain venues almost impossible to guarantee. § Age
is difficult if not impossible to verify in certain online environments. § Vulnerable
persons are difficult to identify in certain online environments. § Informed
consent of the actual participant (the persona corresponding to the driver’s
license) is difficult to attain in writing if the participant desires
anonymity from the researcher. Some
of the above generate general ethical issues; others generate official red
flags for institutional research boards, which govern research of human
subjects at institutions of higher education.
utilitarian and communitarian
approaches Are Institutional Review Boards (IRBs) in the Officially, IRBs
require researchers to preserve the autonomy of human subjects (respect for
persons), distribute fairly both the benefits and burdens of research
(justice), and secure the well-being of subjects by avoiding or minimizing
harm (beneficence). Pragmatically, to
adhere to the general IRB regulations, a researcher would ask: First, does
the research protect the autonomy of the human subject? Second, do the potential benefits of study
outweigh the risks posed to the human subject? Operationalized
in the Doing enough “good,” according to
Christians (2000), becomes a matter of determining what makes the majority of
people happy. Combined with a strong
tradition in positivism, which values neutrality and validity through
scientifically verifiable measures, determinations of “happiness” are largely
restricted to those domains that are extrinsic, observable, and measurable
(p. 138-142). “In its conceptual
structure, IRB policy is designed to produce the best ration of benefits to
costs. IRBs
ostensibly protect the subjects who fall under the protocols they approve.
However, given the interlocking utilitarian functions of social science, the
academy, and the state. . . , IRBs in reality
protect their own institutions rather than subject populations in society at
large (see Vanderpool, 1996, chaps. 2-6)” (p.
141). Thomas (2003) adds to this,
noting: “Too often, [IRB] decisions seem driven not so much by protecting
research subjects, but by following federally mandated bureaucratic
procedures that will protect the institution from sanctions in the event of a
federal audit” (p. 196). IRBs are designed to provide guidelines where they might
otherwise be ignored; in that, the regulations are sensible. But when these guidelines are used as an
exclusive means of defining the ethical boundaries of one’s work, the spirit
of the regulation has been replaced by unreflexive
adherence to the letter of the law. This stance gets turned upside down (or
right side up, depending on how you look at it) when we examine the ethical
sphere of other countries. Ess (2001) outlines the European perspective as one that
is more deontological. Citizens enjoy
a much greater protection of privacy regarding data collection and use. Research stresses the protection of
individual rights, “first of all, the right to privacy—even at the cost of
thereby losing what might be research that promises to benefit the larger
whole” (Ess & AoIR
working committee on ethics, 2002, p. 20). If we take a look at the contrast
between § What
ethical expectations are established by the venue? § When
should one ask for informed consent? § What
medium for informed consent (email, fax, Instant Messaging) would best
protect the human subject? § In
studying groups with a high turnover rate, is obtaining permission from the
moderator/facilitator/list owner, etc., sufficient? § What
are the initial ethical expectations/assumptions of the authors/subjects
being studied? For example: Do participants in this environment
assume/believe that their communication is private? § Will
the material be referred to by direct quotation or paraphrased? § Will
the material be attributed to a specified person? Referred to by his/her real name?
Pseudonym? “Double-pseudonym?” (i.e.,
a pseudonym for a frequently used pseudonym?) Chris
Mann (2002), a British sociologist specializing in the study of ethics,
distills the issues into a set of three very simple questions: § Are
we seeking to magnify the good? § Are
we acting in ways that do not harm others? § Do
we recognize the autonomy of others and acknowledge that they are of equal
worth to ourselves and should be treated so? These
criteria shift the focus away from utility and regulation and place the
emphasis squarely on the purpose of the research, a point made clearly by
Denzin (1997, 2003) in discussing a feminist communitarian stance. An example illustrating the difference
between these stances and possible outcomes is the “Am I working with human subjects or public documents?” The
question arises in a study wherein the scholar is using publicly accessed
archives of online discourse. Many
Internet scholars contend that publicly accessible online discourse does not
require human subject approval because the domains in which these texts are
produced are public (Walther, 2002).
This determination is derived from arguments about the regulatory
definitions of what constitutes human subjects research. Walther further notes that while
participants might perceive that the space is private and therefore their
texts are private, this perception is “extremely misplaced” (p. 3). Posed to a colleague in To further clarify the distinction,
note that the title of this current section of this chapter highlights ethics
alongside their regulatory body for academics, the IRB. My choice in heading reflects a utilitarian
stance. On the contrary, when
describing the issues facing Internet researchers, Bromseth
(2003) never mentions a regulatory body at all, instead focusing on the
respondent. She writes within the
communitarian or deontological stance, “Researchers have been forced to
rethink basic issues . . . to be able to develop and apply approaches that
work for ourselves and our research goals and that would be ethically
defensible in relation to our informants” (p. 68). With deeply rooted standpoints and few
universal principles, how should one treat texts and websites, which may or
may not be vital to the subjectivity of the author; which may or may not be
considered private by the author; which may or may not be important to our
individual research goals? There are
no simple conclusions to be drawn in the arena of ethical Internet research.
Institutional research boards will continue to regulate the activities of
scholars. National, regional, and
cultural principles will undoubtedly remain distinct; ethical guidelines are
entrenched in larger socio-political-economic structures of meaning. Internet researchers will continue to argue
the issues of publicly accessible documents; anonymity; copyright;
presentation of other; and privacy.
Excellent overviews of opposing positions can be found in various
journals, online reports, and conference/workshop proceedings.[4] Given the variations in ethical stances
as well as the diversity of methodological choices, each researcher must
explore and define research within their own integral frameworks. Thomas (2003) recommends a more proactive
approach to ethical behavior than simply adhering to rules set out by IRBs. “In this
view, we recognize the potential ambiguity of social situations in which most
value decisions are made and commit ourselves not to rules, but to broad
principles of justice and beneficence” (p. 197, also see Ess
and the AOIR ethics working committee, 2002).
As to how one might determine what these broad principles actually
are, Stephen L. Carter (1996) reminds us of what it means to have integrity. It involves not only discerning what is
right and what is wrong, but also acting on this discernment, even at
personal cost, and publicly acknowledging and defending one’s stance and
choices. Acting with integrity, Carter
adds, “demands that we take the time for genuine reflection to be certain
that the [morality] we are pressing is right” (p. 204). Rethinking the purpose of
research My ten years of experience as an online
researcher lead me to believe that it is time to reassess our priorities and
processes as researchers. Instead of
asking “how we can protect human subjects through various types of research
design?” we will frame better questions and find richer answers by shifting
our focus toward the participant.
Putting the human subject squarely in the center of the research both
shifts the ethical considerations and allows for socially responsible
research. All ethnographically informed research,
particularly in computer-mediated environments, includes decisions about how
to draw boundaries around groups, what to leave in as meaningful data and
what to dismiss as unimportant, and how to explain what we think we know to
our audiences. These research design decisions, which are often dismissed as
simple logistics and not often mentioned in methods texts or ethics
discussions, influence the representation of research participants; highlight
particular findings while dismissing others; create ideologically-charged
bases of knowledge and, ultimately, impact legislation and policy
making. This chain of events requires astute,
reflexive methodological attention. We
make choices, either consciously or unconsciously, throughout the research
process. Researchers must grapple with
natural and necessary change engendered by vivid awareness of the constructed
nature of science, knowledge, and culture.
One way to meet the future is to learn
from but not rely on the past.
Practically speaking, this involves a return to the fundamental
question: Why are we doing research? Politically speaking, this involves taking
risks that will productively stretch the academy’s understanding of what
inquiry intends to produce. The Internet continues to provide a
unique space for the construction of identity in that it offers anonymity in
an exclusively discursive environment. The difficulty of observing and
interviewing in these contexts is that our expectations remain rooted in
embodied ways of collecting, analyzing and interpreting information.
Simply put, our methods are still more suitable for research in physically
proximal contexts. Moreover, although the technology of the internet
has afforded us greater reach to participants and provided a space for
researchers to interact with participants in creative ways, our
epistemological frameworks have not yet shifted to match this reality. It is necessary not only to accommodate the
features of computer-mediated communication into our basic assumptions, but
also to interrogate and rework the underlying premises we use to make sense
of the world. Computer mediated communication
highlights key paradoxes of social research in that personae being
represented are already one step removed from their bodies when encountered
by the researcher. Doing research of
life online has compelled me to recognize that I have always taken for
granted my ability to parse human experience by carefully paying attention to
people’s activities in context.
Engaging in meaningful experiences with anonymous beings and
interviewing people I cannot see face to face, I can identify many of the
weaknesses of qualitative research processes in general. Interviewing or observing in natural
settings, researchers rely on the ability to judge a face, looking for visual
signs of authentic emotion and inauthentic pretense. We make immediate categorizing decisions
based on first impressions, listening to the tenor of a voice on the phone or
looking at body type, ethnic markers, hair style and color, and clothing
brands. Even the most astute and
cautious researchers unconsciously rely on habitual patterns of sense making
in everyday interactions with others. We must directly engage the fact that
the questions driving the research must change to accommodate the enduring
partiality of scientific knowing.
Political action is a sensible shift, therefore, in that it does not
seek to find the truth, but to create the possibilities for people to enjoy a
better life. In whatever ways we utilize the
potential of Internet-mediated communication to facilitate our social
inquiry, ethically sensitive approaches are complicated, even impeded, by our
methodological training. Depending on the academic discipline we find
ourselves working within, we will be encouraged in varying
degrees to oversimplify the complexity of human experience, transforming the
mysteries of interaction into discrete variables that are easily measured.
This is done for admirable reason and by no means am I recommending a
complete dismissal of traditional means of collecting and analyzing
data. At the same time, Internet contexts prompt us to reconsider the
foundations of our methods and compel us to assess the extent to which our
methods are measuring what we think they are, or getting to the heart of what
we have assumed they did. Through the
Internet, we have the opportunity to observe how written discourse functions
to construct meaning and how textual dialogue can form the basis of cultural
understanding. The taken-for-granted methods we use to make sense of
participants in our research projects need thorough reexamination in light of
our growing comprehension of how intertextuality literally occurs. Even within a contemporary framework of
sociological inquiry—whereby the distinction between the researcher and
researched is problematized, the researcher’s role is acknowledged, and bias
is accepted as a fundamental fact of interpretation—our obligation to the
participant remains. We make decisions, conscious or unconscious, about
what constitutes the virtual field and subject of study. Often dismissed as logistical, research
design decisions, these choices make a great difference in what is studied,
how it is studied, and eventually, how society defines and frames computer
mediated communication environments.
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[1] The trend is exaggerated here to illustrate the extremes. Speculative and exaggerated accounts are important to consider because they influenced research premises throughout the 1990s. This is not to say that empirical research was absent or unimportant. The impact of electronic technologies on individual communication practices and social structure has been explored for decades, most well represented by scholars like Marshall McLuhan (1964), Harold Innis (1964), James Carey (1989), and Neil Postman (1986, 1993). Throughout the ‘80s, significant empirical and theoretical research examined the impact of computers and information technology on the practices and structures of work. Sociological accounts (e.g., Turkle, 1984) studied important intersections of technology, self, and society. Crucial to the point is that many exciting but exaggerated texts appeared in the early 1990s, both in trade and academic presses, which fueled further speculative research and led to the publication of accounts that had more novel appeal than careful scholarship in an era of exciting new technological developments. As this field of inquiry evolves, it is vital to examine with a critical lens the foundations upon which current theoretical premises may be built.
[2] A similar categorization of critical junctures was
developed by the author for a keynote address at a Nordic conference on Ethics
and Internet research and has been used subsequently in related publications (
[3] The material in this section is being written
concurrently for a chapter in an edited collection (
[4]The Information Society, for example, hosted a special issue in 1996 on the ethics of Internet research. The Association of Internet Researchers released a comprehensive report of various stances, comparative guidelines and an extensive list of resources (2002); a conference panel yielded a set of articles which lay out various perspectives in a special issue of Ethics and Technology (2002); the first Nordic conference and graduate seminar on ethics and Internet research yielded the edited volume Applied ethics in Internet research, containing keynote addresses and case studies by Scandinavian students (Thorseth, 2003); and an edited volume by Johns, Chen, & Hall, (2003) entitled Online social research offers various perspectives and cases. Many other sources discuss both general and specific issues related to internet research and ethics. All of these resources offer both novice and experienced researchers valuable philosophical, practical, and legal information.