Exploring Ethical Dilemmas in Research: A Case-Based Approach, Study notes of Geography

Download Exploring Ethical Dilemmas in Research: A Case-Based Approach and more Study notes Geography in PDF only on Docsity! Chapter 12 – Private People, Secret Places: Ethical Research in Practice Iain Hay and Mark Israel Activities ACTIVITY 12.1: RESEARCH ETHICS—THE REGULATORY CONTEXT Goal: To explore, understand, and interrogate the institutional and organizational contexts within which research is considered to be ethical. Overview: Novice researchers need to be aware of the research ethics expectations and requirements of institutions and organizations. This exercise encourages participants to work independently and collectively to uncover the ethical codes, guidelines, and regulations that may bear on their work. It also challenges researchers to give preliminary consideration to the power relations behind those regulations and to the fraught relationship between ethical regulation and ethical conduct. Activity Type: Following a short introduction, this activity is best used as a take- home assignment followed by a group discussion in which participants report back on and discuss their findings. Time: About 10 minutes for introduction in Session 1 and 1 hour for group discussion in Session 2 following participant opportunity (perhaps over 7–10 days between meetings) for individual research. Readings: 1. Research Ethics chapter from this book, Aspiring Academics. 2. Optional reading: Israel, M., & I. Hay. 2006. Research Ethics for Social Scientists: Between Ethical Conduct and Regulatory Compliance. London: Sage (especially Chapter 4). Procedure: Session 1 1. Lead brief preliminary discussion on Aspiring Academics research ethics chapter focusing on the need to be aware of and understand the broad institutional and organizational contexts within which research ethics are considered. 2. Ask participants to complete the following tasks before the next group meeting: a) Read Israel and Hay (2006, especially 41–45). b) Collate information about the proposal submission requirements of the appropriate Institutional Review Board (IRB) or in Canada, the Research Ethics Board (REB) that will deal with any specific research application they might submit. Lists of registered boards can be found for the United States at the Department of Health and Human Services Office for Human Research Protection (OHRP) IRB Guidebook web site and, for Canada, at the Canadian Association of Research Ethics Boards. c) Search for those professional ethical codes or guidelines that are most relevant to their specific research and disciplinary interests (e.g., AAG, URISA). Many ethical codes can be found through the Illinois Institute of Technology’s Codes of Ethics online archive. d) Prepare answers to the following questions: i) Do the submission requirements, codes and guidelines help you understand what constitutes ethical conduct in research? If so, how? If not, why not? ii) On which guidelines are you expected to place greatest weight? Why? Does this reflect the moral authority of the guidance or is the mandate drawn from other sources (e.g., economic power, legislative authority, biomedical expertise)? iii) Does compliance with institutional and organizational guidelines and requirements lead to more ethical research? How? Does it cause any problems? Session 2 1. Ask participants to identify the full range of codes and guidelines they uncovered and their source (e.g., URL). Record these on a whiteboard, overhead transparency, or computer as a shared record. 2. Have participants form into groups of three, and spend 15–20 minutes explaining to one another their answers to Question d (i, ii, and iii). 3. Reconvene and invite comments about the answers from the entire class, taking account of the full list of codes and guidelines. This might take 20–25 minutes. If required, some useful prompts for additional discussion and closing might include: a) Why is there an abundance of ethical guidelines? b) How, as geographers, sometimes working in cross-disciplinary and cross- national areas, can we best negotiate this terrain? Extension This Activity can be extended by asking participants to apply the institutional and organizational codes to one or more Case Studies set out in the next Activity, “A Case for Ethics.” This may reveal both the value and limitation of basing our ethical decision making on formal codes. 2 4. Probing Initial Positions Participants’ independently prepared notes on the ethical scenario(s) can now form the basis of small group in-class discussions and Socratic dialogue with the facilitator and all other participants. The Socratic Method is most commonly associated with legal education and typically involves a teacher-facilitator asking students tough questions to reveal the underlying principles of law embedded in the case under scrutiny (Carter and Unklesbay 1989, 528). The intention is not to prompt participants to a single, “correct” answer. In this ethics practical exercise, the facilitator and participants should confront each speaker with questions about their ethical position and the reasons for the position drawing when appropriate from professional and other context-specific (e.g., Institutional Review Board) guidelines. All participants should be probing one another’s (and their own) responses thoughtfully by, for example, questioning relevance and consistency. The central purpose of Socratic questioning is to provoke thought and to draw out the clearest, most defensible positions from participants. It is not intended to be an overzealous and damaging scrutiny of any single person’s perspective. Nevertheless, the Socratic Method can feel confrontational and threatening, especially to those students from cultural or linguistic groups who feel less comfortable with oral communication than others, do not come from backgrounds where argument is used commonly as a means of clarifying thought, or those who feel especially committed to a particular position. In such situations, participants could be formed into groups:  by inviting individuals to identify their position on a continuum and then work with like-minded individuals. The group could discuss their point of view while the rest of the class looks on (a “fishbowl” exercise);  asked to formulate a position and to argue that position collectively with another small group;  and assigned a position to argue, irrespective of their individual beliefs about the case. (Other useful approaches are set out in Pimple [2002].) The length of time spent on a case will depend on matters such as the complexity of issues involved and student perceptiveness. Care needs to be taken to ensure students have the opportunity to reflect on their views, acquire additional information, and muster the courage to comment where they might before have been timid. Upon hearing the carefully reasoned views of a colleague, one’s own ethical position may alter. 5. Refining Positions This stage is intended to help participants clarify, refine, and qualify their views. Participants might rewrite their original opinion in the light of the group’s comments. Such written work should expand upon, capitalize on, and confirm lessons learned through discussions with other students. As such, it should support “deep learning,” characterized by Bradbeer (1996, 12) as that process in which “the student engages in an active search for meaning and attempts to relate it to prior learning and experience and, in so doing, transforms the knowledge gained.” 5 6. Testing Positions Finally, Step Six offers additional testing of the participants’ arguments by checking to see if they can stand up to higher level scrutiny. This may be achieved through formal written or oral assessment. Alternatively, if time is available, engagement with the thoughtful ethical views of a small group of people can be encouraged through, for example, the use of writing groups (Hay and Delaney 1994). 7. Extension This Activity can be extended by asking participants to generate further examples of ethical challenges in research, as follows: 1. Using the Chronicle of Higher Education web site , search for examples of dilemmas in research ethics in fields relevant to your interests using some of the key words in Section 3 (and Table 1) of these resources. If you wish to look into international sources, consider The Times Higher Education Supplement , or The Australian Higher Education Supplement . 2. Identify how the researcher involved responded to the dilemma. This might involve a further search for details of the researcher on Chronicle in Higher Education archives, the researcher’s own web site, as well as relevant full-text databases. 3. Where appropriate, work through the process set out in the accompanying chapter, Private People, Secret Places, to develop your own response to each dilemma and compare it with decisions made by the researcher and/or some of your colleagues. 4. Teachers/facilitators might consider placing these new cases online, perhaps using a wiki, to enable asynchronous, collaborative construction of additional learning- and-teaching resources. References Associated Press Newswires. 2004. Students Falsified Survey Judge Cited in Moving Scott Peterson's Murder Trial, 10 January. Association of American Geographers. 1998. Statement on Professional Ethics. Available at http://www.aag.org/Publications/EthicsStatement.html (9 July 2007). Bradbeer, J. 1996. Problem-based Learning and Fieldwork: A Better Method of Preparation. Journal of Geography in Higher Education 20 (1): 11–18. Burns, R.P. 1995. Teaching the Basic Ethics Class through Simulation: The Northwestern Program in Advocacy and Professionalism. Law and Contemporary Problems 58 (3 and 4): 37–50. Carter, K., and R. Unklesbay. 1989. Cases in Teaching and Law. Journal of Curriculum Studies 21 (6): 527–536. Dulaney, W.L. 2005. A Brief History of “Outlaw” Motorcycle Clubs. International Journal of Motorcycle Studies 1 (3). http://ijms.nova.edu/November2005/IJMS_Artcl.Dulaney.html (last accessed 10 July 2007). Harrell-Bond, B. 1976. Studying Elites: Some Special Problems. In Ethics and Anthropology: Dilemmas in Fieldwork, eds. M.A. Rynkiewich and J.P. Spradley, 110–122. New York: John Wiley. 6 Hastings Center (Institute of Society, Ethics, and the Life Sciences) 1979. The Teaching of Ethics in Higher Education. Hastings-on-Hudson, NY: Hastings Center. Hay, I. 2003. Ethical Practice in Geographical Research. In Key Methods in Geography, eds. G. Valentine and N. Clifford, 37–53. London: Sage. Hay, I. 1998a. From Code to Conduct. Professional Ethics in New Zealand Geography. New Zealand Geographer 54 (2): 21–27. Hay, I. 1998b. Making Moral Imaginations. Research Ethics, Pedagogy, and Professional Human Geography. Ethics, Place, and Environment 1 (1): 55–76. Hay, I., and E. Delaney. 1994. Who Teaches, Learns: Writing Groups in Geographical Education. Journal of Geography in Higher Education 18 (3): 217–234. Hay, I., and P. Foley. 1998. Ethics, Geography, and Responsible Citizenship. Journal of Geography in Higher Education 22 (2): 169–183. Hay, I., and M. Israel. 2005. A Case for Ethics (not Conformity). In “Professing”Humanist Sociology, eds. G.A. Goodwin and M.D. Schwartz, M.D, 26–31. (5th edition). Washington D.C.: American Sociological Association. International Committee of Medical Journal Editors. 2006. Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals: Writing and Editing for Biomedical Publication. http://www.icmje.org (last accessed 9 July 2007). Israel, M., and I. Hay. 2006. Research Ethics for Social Scientists: Between Ethical Conduct and Regulatory Compliance. London: Sage. Marcuse, P. 1985. Professional Ethics and Beyond: Values in Planning. In Ethics in Planning, ed. M. Wachs, 3–24. New Brunswick, NJ: Center for Urban Policy Research, Rutgers University. Mitchell, B., and D. Draper. 1982. Relevance and Ethics in Geography. London: Longman. Pimple, K.D. 2002. Using Small Group Assignments in Teaching Research Ethics. http://poynter.indiana.edu/tre/kdp-groups.pdf (last accessed 23 August 2006). Stuart, B.L., AG.J. Rhodin, L.L. Grismer, and T. Hansel. 2006. Scientific Description Can Imperil Species. Science 312: 1137. Symanski, R. 1974. Prostitution in Nevada. Annals of the Association of American Geographers 64: 357–377. Tolich, M. 2002. An Ethical Iceberg: Do Connected Persons’ Confidentiality Warrant Vulnerable Person Status? Paper presented to the joint IIPE/AAPAE Conference, Brisbane, Australia, 4 October. http://www.iipe.org/conference 2002/papers/Tolich.pdf. 7 Case Number 7: Geckos for Sale To prompt discussion: 1. As Stuart et al. (2006, 1137) point out, “Withholding locality information from new species descriptions might hamper profiteers, but it also hampers science and conservation.” Should scientists withhold from their publications and public statements information about new species locations? 2. How does your response to this case compare with that to Case Number 8? Keywords: Harm and Good Case Number 8: Work and Stigmatized Places To prompt discussion: 1. Is it appropriate for the researcher to keep the address strategy information secret? What might be the consequences of that behavior, including for those unemployed people who do not know of and do not engage in the deception? 2. How does your response to this case compare with that to Case Number 7? Keywords: Confidentiality; Fabrication and Falsification; Harm and Good; Informed Consent Case Number 9: The Power of Maps To prompt discussion: 1. Are researchers responsible for the uses to which their data and findings are put? What responsibilities do researchers have to manage the use of their research results? 2. How can Tropic evaluate the relative harms and benefits of disclosing the research results? 3. Does Tropic owe anything to the research organization or his discipline? Keywords: Conflicts of Interest; Harm and Good; Relationships Case Number 10: Government Papers To prompt discussion: 1. Was it right for Arroyo to hold back papers for his own benefit and without his employer’s consent? Why? 2. Is it appropriate for Arroyo to use the secretly acquired documents in his thesis? Is there a case for arguing that the potential public good of Arroyo’s 10 findings outweighs any bureaucratic and legal issues about using the data without consent? In short, do the ends justify the means? Keywords: Confidentiality; Conflicts of Interest; Harm and Good; Informed Consent; Relationships Case Number 11: Dam Consents To prompt discussion: 1. Was the no-consent approach the right approach? Did the time saving of a year justify Harmattan’s disregard for farmers’ private property “rights”? Should Harmattan have examined only those dams he could see from the road and subsequently sought permission to visit the remainder which he could not see? Justify your opinion. You may find it useful to compare your views on this case with those you reach in Case 20: Hot on Their Heels. 2. Was it appropriate of Harmattan’s committee chair to agree to the no-consent approach? Keywords: Harm and Good; Informed Consent Case Number 12: “They Did That Last Week” To prompt discussion: 1. It would appear from the circumstances and from the very high response rate that students were not free to refuse to participate in the study. Is it ethical for Ria to use results that have been acquired without free and informed consent. Why? 2. Given that Ria is working under tight and expensive time constraints for her master’s degree, what should she do about her thesis? 3. Would your answer to Question 1 change if the survey had been administered to adults? What if it dealt with some sensitive issue such as sexual assault or if the results had been acquired, also without consent, through the use of physical force (e.g., World War II experiments on prisoners of war)? Keywords: Confidentiality; Conflicts of Interest; Informed Consent Case Number 13: Abused Wives To prompt discussion: 1. Was it appropriate for Gibber to work at the refuge when she was motivated primarily by her desire to gather research information? Discuss. 2. Was it appropriate for Gibber to conduct her research covertly? How would your answers compare if Gibber’s work had involved participant observation 11 of an outlaw motorcycle gang? (See for example the work of William L. Dulaney [2005].) Keywords: Harm and Good; Informed Consent Case Number 14: My Best Friend? To prompt discussion: 1. Is it ethical for the researcher to manipulate a personal relationship for the purposes of acquiring information? Compare your thoughts with the attitudes you might have to “networking” as part of a search for employment. 2. Is the researcher being deceitful? Should she use information she is privileged to receive in this way in her research project? Keywords: Informed Consent; Relationships Case Number 15: Situation Vacant To prompt discussion: 1. The student knew that to tell the person who was about to become unemployed of the vacancy would violate the promised confidence; it might also mean that each party would know why the other had been interviewed; and it would reveal the promise of confidentiality to be rather thin. What should the student do? Justify your opinion. 2. Does your response to Question 1 depend on the subject matter of the research interviews (e.g., does it make a difference if the interviews were with mercenaries, people involved in the sex industry, or with health care workers)? Keywords: Confidentiality; Harm and Good Case Number 16: Fairly Recognized? To prompt discussion: 1. Comment on the appropriateness of representation of authorship in this case. It may be very helpful to compare your answer with the influential advice set out in the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors’ (2006) Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals: Writing and Editing for Biomedical Publication. Keywords: Authorship 12 Case Number 22: Can I Buy You a Drink . . . ? To prompt discussion: 1. Symanski presumably believed the prostitutes would not participate in his study if he explained his reasons for wanting to talk with them (Mitchell and Draper 1983, 13). Given this, was Symanski’s artifice appropriate? Why? Would your opinion differ if the interviewees were employed in some other income-earning activity? 2. Rather than just buying them drinks, should Symanski have paid the prostitutes for their time at the same rate they were paid by clients for sexual services? Keywords: Informed Consent Case Number 23: Students Faked Survey To prompt discussion: 1. Depending on the size of the study and the scale of faked input, the study may have legitimately concluded that Scott Peterson could not get a fair trial in Stanislaus County. If so, what’s the problem? Keywords: Fabrication and Falsification; Harm and Good 15 Aspiring Academics Chapter 12 - Ethical Research in Practice Cases for Discussion (Handout for Participants) Following are real cases of ethical dilemmas/problems confronted by geographers and people working in related disciplines. In some cases, names and other details have been changed to protect identity. The cases deal with research situations and with some professional relationships. They give some insights to the range of difficulties researchers may confront in their day-to-day practice. Case Number 1: Whose Turn Is It? Hornblende is a graduate student with an interest in geomorphology. He is taken to a field site by Professor Volatiles who believes that Hornblende might think the area was worth researching for his thesis. Another professor, Feldspar, from a different university, meets Hornblende and Volatiles at the site. All three inspect the area. Hornblende decides he is not interested in the area for his thesis, but nevertheless he works with Volatiles to produce a conference poster on the area. Volatiles includes Feldspar’s name as one of the authors on the poster because the two professors almost always coauthored work, simply switching senior author (i.e., first author) from paper to paper. Hornblende feels aggrieved because it seems to him that, in this case, Feldspar had contributed very little, if anything to the project. Case Number 2: The “Right” Projections In Oldport, U.S.A., the mayor commissioned a firm of planning consultants to develop a comprehensive twenty-year strategy for urban renewal and for the provision of housing, schools, and social service facilities. The planning consultants’ preliminary report projected moderate population growth but pointed to the likelihood of a substantial change in racial composition. It was estimated that minority groups would make up more than half of the city’s population within twelve years. The planners also predicted that there would be an African-American population majority in the public schools within five years. The mayor reacted very strongly to the preliminary report. She felt if the findings were released, they could become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Her hopes of preserving an ethnically integrated school system; maintaining stable, mixed neighborhoods; and developing an ethnically heterogeneous city could be dashed. The mayor asked the planners to reconsider their population estimates. They agreed to use the lower range of their projections. These suggested minority dominance in the public schools after eight years and a majority in the city in sixteen. The mayor was not happy. She told the planners to change the figures or to leave them out of the report. The planning consultants refused, arguing they had bent their interpretation of fact as far as they could. They also thought that without a discussion of those population projections, the rest of the report would be unconvincing. In private, the mayor criticized the planning consultants for their professional arrogance. She went on to ask a member of her own staff to rewrite the report without the projections and ordered the consultants not to make public their findings under 16 any circumstances. The mayoral staffer initially refused to write the report, but eventually agreed. The consultants kept quiet about the results, completed the formal requirements of their contract, and left. After this experience, the mayor never used professional planning consultants again. (This example is drawn from Marcuse [1985, 5] and was presented earlier in Hay and Foley [1998]). Case Number 3: Whistle Blowing In the course of her own Ph.D. research in Canada, Descartes uncovers a thesis proposal submitted by a degree candidate at another university in another country. A third of that proposal has been taken without any attribution from Descartes’ own work. She is hurt and angered by the plagiarism and yet when urged by her supervisor to be a “whistle blower” and write to the department in question, she refuses (Kates 1994, 2). (This case was presented earlier in Hay [1998a]). Case Number 4: Out of the Blue As a young university graduate, Coral found herself working for a scientific research organization studying pollution damage to Australia’s Great Barrier Reef. The organization had a problem common to much scientific research—how to get enough funding to carry on the work. All their worries appeared to be solved when quite out of the blue one of the large multinational corporations operating in the country offered significant ongoing financial support. There was a hitch, however. The company had recently suffered adverse publicity through an article claiming they were themselves responsible for some of the pollution. In return for the financial support, they not only wanted the research company to refute these claims but also to study a section of the reef where there were no pollution problems. Case Number 5: Grass? Ethnographer David Fetterman was conducting field research in a U.S. inner-city area for a contract research corporation by which he was employed. One of the research “subjects,” known by Fetterman to have an extensive knowledge of illegal drug dealing in the local area, asked Fetterman out for something to eat. In the course of that interaction, the researcher was confronted with a number of dilemmas. Fetterman (1983, 216–7) describes the situation: “We walked down the main street of the inner city for a few blocks until he pointed to a health food store. . . . We entered the establishment and my friend asked the clerk to give me a granola [muesli] bar. I said thanks and reached for the bar. The patron handed it to me with a smile and a small envelope underneath it. I looked down at a ‘nickel’ bag of marijuana. . . . My [feeling of] discomfort was compounded by two policemen walking by viewing the exchange. The policemen saw the transaction, smiled and continued walking. When I asked my friend why they didn’t bust us, he said, ‘they don’t need the money right now.’ I asked him to clarify his response and he explained: “They only bust you if they need the money. They get paid off regular. But if they’re hurting for money, then well, that’s another different story. They’ll come right in and bust ya, take money out of the cash register and take your dope too. If 17 voluntary and that no one is obliged to answer any of the questions asked. A few weeks before she intends to administer the questionnaire, Ria leaves near-final drafts of it with the students’ teachers for comment. The draft copy of the questionnaire does not include the cover letter. It is Ria’s intention to revise the questionnaire in light of each teacher’s comments and then return to the schools to administer the questionnaire during “home group” meeting times. About a week after she leaves the survey forms with the teachers, Ria calls them to find out if they have had an opportunity to comment on the questionnaire. The first teacher has just returned the questionnaire—with no amendments—by post. However, Ria finds the second teacher had already made multiple copies of the forms and had administered the questionnaire to her student “home group.” He asks Ria to come along to collect the completed forms. Ria scuttles off to the school immediately. She finds the questionnaires had been completed fully by every student present in the home group. Only one student from the class of 30 had been absent so the response rate was 97%—a remarkably high rate. Ria feels she cannot ask the teacher to readminister the survey because he has already indicated several times that he is tired of his requests for assistance and access to the class (from Hay [2003]). Case Number 13: Abused Wives An Australian social geographer, Dr. Gibber, is conducting research into the ways physically abused wives adjust to life after they have fled their marital home. As part of her work she becomes a volunteer worker in an inner city women’s refuge. Although her input is valuable to the refuge, Dr. Gibber is more interested in gathering research information than she is in providing succor and sustenance. No one at the refuge is aware of her real purpose for being there. Gibber deliberately becomes friendly with those people who might offer information useful in the research and some of the women in the refuge grow to like her. Once the research work is completed, Gibber leaves the refuge and leaves no information as to her location. No one at the refuge ever hears from her again. No one is ever told of her real reason for volunteering to work in the refuge. No one in the refuge is ever likely to see the products of Dr. Gibber’s work. Case Number 14: My Best Friend? In the course of a lengthy research project, a geographer working overseas with an indigenous group forms a friendship with one person who has privileged access to information about that society. Seeing the friendship as an opportunity to gain access to information that might not otherwise be accessible to her, the researcher chooses to cultivate the relationship and is eventually provided with valuable information no other visitor has seen (from Hay [1998b]). Case Number 15: Situation Vacant In the course of Ph.D. research, an interviewee tells the research student of a job vacancy in the company he manages. This occurs shortly after the student had interviewed someone else who expected to be retrenched very soon from a job similar to that which is vacant. In an introductory letter provided to all respondents before interviews, the Ph.D. student had stated quite clearly they would remain anonymous and all information they disclosed would be confidential. 20 Case Number 16: Fairly Recognized? A major multi-author geological report is published by a national geological survey. Authorship of specific chapters is not indicated anywhere in the publication. Most of the fifteen chapters were written by Goode and Mercator. Miller was the “editor” who brought the volume together and was heavily involved with production details (e.g., communicating with the printer and drafting personnel). Despite these individual contributions, authorship on the title page of the report is listed as Lambert, Miller, Goode, Mercator, and Peters. The publication is commonly referred to as “Lambert and others.” Lambert was the principal geologist in the section of the state geological survey that produced the volume. He had written one chapter of the book. Case Number 17: Over a Port or Two An economic geographer is conducting a study for a proposed port development in a small island state. If completed, the port will be the second one in the country. The geographer is part of a consortium including the group of civil engineers who hope a favorable report will allow them to get the contract to build the new port. Indeed the engineers need the contract if that part of their operation is not to be severely “downsized.” The geographer is advising on the economic viability and value of the development. The port will undoubtedly be built since the President promised the town the development and made it clear that international money was available. But the geographer finds there is no economic rationale for the port. The existing port could be upgraded at a fraction of the cost, and the new port is not really in the best location given the existing transport network (from Hay [1998b]). Case Number 18: Shops in Space Dr. Moraine is a retail geographer who has just been asked to advise a major supermarket chain about possible locations and sites for town edge superstores. The construction of these supermarkets is more or less inevitable. The simple question is, Where should they be located? One almost inevitable consequence of the chain’s policy is blight in city outskirts where property values close to the proposed sites would fall. Additionally, the policy is likely to lead to the disappearance, or reduction in number, of inner suburban shops which, in turn, are likely to leave the predominantly poor and the elderly people in those areas with only high price “convenience stores” (from Hay [1998b]). Case Number 19: A Little Bit of Espionage? Professor Barchan is in a foreign country on a research visit sponsored by the host nation and the U.S. government. At an appointment with U.S. Embassy officials, Professor Barchan is asked to look for special information on some local activities the United States wishes to stop. Embassy officials point out to Barchan that her position as an academic researcher will allow her to move freely all over the country, whereas embassy personnel are under constant surveillance. Although no one mentions it, Barchan is aware this intelligence gathering exercise could be life-threatening. To refuse will mark her as uncooperative in the eyes of the U.S. officials. Barchan also 21 relies on the embassy and its various extensions for information and assistance she needs for her work. (This case was presented earlier in Hay [1998b].) Case Number 20: Hot on Their Heels To describe patterns of pedestrians’ use of inner city Seattle, a group of researchers employ a technique called “tracking,” in which they follow a sample of pedestrians in the downtown area and record their movements and activities. The study involves observation of behavior in public places and the study is concerned with aggregate rather than individual patterns of behavior (Grey et al., in Mitchell and Draper 1983, 13) (from Hay [1998b]). Case Number 21: A Small World? For several years in the late 1960s, Barbara Harrell-Bond conducted fieldwork in Sierra Leone. Her work focused on the experiences of those people with professional qualifications who were working in the country. There were 754 people so qualified. While she realized these people were often closely connected through kinship and that most knew one another, it was not until very late in her research that she came to understand just how much they knew of each other’s personal affairs. In the first report outlining her research findings, Harrell-Bond found some readers could identify almost everyone discussed in the report and, moreover, that they could provide other details about those people such as their political affiliations, the spouse’s ethnic background, educational qualifications, and other, more intimate, details. This occurred despite Harrell-Bond’s attempts to conceal the identity of the individuals concerned. After careful consideration, Harrell-Bond could see there was no way she could disguise the identity of individuals in her report adequately (from Harrell-Bond [1976]). Case Number 22: Can I Buy You a Drink . . . ? In work on geographical aspects of brothel prostitution in Nevada, Richard Symanski apparently did not explain the reason for his research when he talked with prostitutes in brothels. In a footnote to his published work on the topic, he wrote he wanted: . . . to thank the many prostitutes who unknowingly gave me insights into prostitution in Nevada for little more than the price of a drink. I owe them an apology for deceiving them as to my true intentions and, in some cases, of depriving them of time with a prospective client.” (Symanski 1974, 357) Case Number 23: Students Faked Survey In 2004, Scott Peterson was charged with murdering his pregnant wife and unborn son. Prosecutors in California sought the death penalty. An Associated Press story (Associated Press Newswires 2004), claimed the trial was moved by the judge from Modesto partly as a result of a survey conducted by 65 criminal justice students from California State University, Stanislaus. The survey apparently revealed that jurors without bias were more likely to be found in the San Francisco Bay area or Southern California than in Stanislaus County, the area which 22