Ethical principles and standards
How do Family & Child Insight work with ethical principles and practice standards?
Ethics in research with families and children is key.
Family & Child Insight has developed ethical principles and practice standards which are applied in research with families and children.
This is inspired by ESOMAR, MRS, child organisations, as well as family and child science.
General ethical considerations in research with children
Ethics in research with children is about the protective responsibility of adult researchers, which are exemplified in child conventions and acts about children’s rights in matters relevant for them, i.e. when it impacts their life and world.
Children have the right to being listened to by participation. In research, this is shown in three levels: Being an object (i.e. the parents or adults only), being a subject (i.e. the child is asked to respond to questions and ideas by adults), and being an active participant (i.e. the child participates equally with the adults around them) (Alderson, 2005).
Within the area of social sciences with children, ethical considerations became a special focus around 2000. Since then, ethics as focus has evolved a long with the increasing focus on participatory and collaborative approaches, which set new requirements to equality, commitment, flexibility, responsiveness, and adaptations during the research, as well as understanding children’s perspectives in the context and social relations, and working with ethical symmetry in the relations between children and researchers (Christensen and Prout, 2002; Loveridge et al., 2023; Backe-Hansen, 2023).
This highlights that we have to target our ethical considerations to the specific case and be aware of the need for adapting across a research activity.
‘Care’ and ‘Safeguarding’
These aspects are in the centre of ethics in research with children (Nairn and Clarke, 2012).
Respect, beneficence, and justice are three keywords, which together with children’s rights to being listened to, e.g. being invited, being asked to give assent for participation, and being a participant who can share perspectives, are the foundation for necessary ethical considerations. This is about treating children as autonomous persons and protecting them by maximising benefits and minimising harm (Alderson & Morrow, 2020).
We can define some ethical principles based on this but keeping in mind to always target to the children, situation, and context:
Respectful – Responsible – Reciprocal – Relational – Relevant – Responsive
Key ethical principles in research with families and children
1. Children have the right to share their voice about relevant matters in their life and world
2. Children and parents are social individuals with different perspectives and with both active influence on decisions within the family unit, which should be respected and acknowledged, and perspectives from both parts bring ground for robust insights
3. Situations in which children should participate in research is only when relevant, interesting, and acceptable to the children based on sufficient child-friendly information and a family dialogue, adding on to the legal parental informed consent
4. Ways in which children should participate in research is based on child-centric approaches with a mix of psychological and pedagogical methods and techniques, combined with special ethical considerations about safety, wellbeing, and child development
5. Perspectives of interest and strategic initiatives based on these should be a mix of economic and social responsibility, looking at current attitudes, behaviour, and challenges in everyday and future life, ideas for targeted solutions, and effects of targeted initiatives
Key ethical practice standards in research with families and children
Before
- Recruitment of selected families and children based on an informed consent from parents and ethical accept from children
- Design of research activities and practicalities targeted to the families and children
- Plan of ethical considerations targeted to the families and children ensuring safety and wellbeing
During
- Collection of perspectives from families and children with family- & child-centric approaches based on children’s development, family interactions, and the situation
- Application of ethical considerations and a special constant awareness of the children targeted to the situation
- Necessary adjustments to the situation
After
- Analysis of research data with an equal balance and a comparison of children and parents’ perspectives
- Transformation of results into actionable insights and further into strategic recommendations balancing economic and social responsibility
- Sharing of insights anonymously and with respect for the families and children
References about ethical research with children (selected)
Alderson P. (2005). Designing ethical research with children. In: Farrell A (ed) Exploring ethical research with children. Buckingham: Open University Press, pages 27-36.
Alderson, P., & Morrow, V. (2020). The ethics of research with children and young people. (Vols. 1-0). SAGE Publications Ltd, https://doi.org/10.4135/9781529682694
Backe-Hansen, Elisabeth, 2023. “Children’s perspectives in context,” Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 154 (C).
Christensen, P., & Prout, A. (2002). Working with Ethical Symmetry in Social Research with Children. Childhood, 9 (4), 477-497. https://doi.org/10.1177/0907568202009004007
Loveridge, J., Wood, B. E., Davis-Rae, E., & McRae, H. (2023). Ethical challenges in participatory research with children and youth. Qualitative Research, 0(0). https://doi.org/10.1177/14687941221149594
Nairn, A., and Clarke, B. (2012). Researching Children: Are We Getting it Right?: A Discussion of Ethics, International Journal of Market Research 54 (2), 177. DOI:10.2501/IJMR-54-2-177-198