Instructions for Ethical Issues in Research on the Web


Below are a number of questions dealing with ethical issues peculiar to web experimentation. At the end are spaces intended to help you to clarify your answers, add new issues, or expand on the questions. Click the radio button to indicate the strength of your agreement with each sentence. The middle button represents "neither agree nor disagree."

1. How many surveys or experiments have you conducted on the Internet?

2. When did you conduct your first experiment via the Internet?

3. Because no professional can be present to assist a person who might have an adverse reaction, remote experimentation by Internet should not be done.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

4. Academic freedom has gone too far, and more restrictions are needed to control the activities of scientists.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

5. Most web experiments are harmless.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

6. Deception should be permitted in Internet studies.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

7. Deception should not be allowed in web studies, or it will give psychology a bad reputation.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

8. As long as a web site is honest, no further restrictions should be applied to Internet research.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

9. It would be acceptable to induce participation by a promise and not fulfill that promise.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

10. It would be immoral as well as illegal to restrict the civil rights of scientists, including the right of freedom of the press.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

11. Web experimentation that consists of textual questions and answers represents free speech and freedom of the press and should not be restricted.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

12. Experimenters should have the same right to freedom of the press as any other citizen.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

13. Experimenters should be more restricted in what they can do on the web than journalists, private citizens, and those in commercial ventures.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

14. It is acceptable to "borrow" or "steal" ideas that are posted on the web.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

15. A person should not examine the source code of another's experiment to see how it works.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

16. An investigator should request permission to use ideas "borrowed" from another's site.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

17. There will probably be disputes over "stealing" or "borrowing" of ideas as more investigators begin to do research on the web.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

18. Anything posted on the web is fair game to be copied and used.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

19. People currently working on the web are helpful and generous.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

20. If personal data are obtained in a study, then they should be kept secure.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

21. If data are anonymous and are not sensitive, then it is ethical for scientists to share such data.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

22. It would be wrong to interfere with or attack another's experiment by "hacker" methods.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

23. An experiment should be thoroughly tested before it is posted, to avoid wasting people's time.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

24. It would be acceptable to do pilot testing of experiments on the Internet.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

25. It would be wrong to post an experiment before the investigator knows exactly how the data will be analyzed.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

26. In the future, there will be competition for participants.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

27. No surveys or experiments should be posted to the web unless they are reviewed by a panel for scientific merit and ethics.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

28. Journalists should not be allowed to ask people questions (to interview people) unless those questions have been approved in advance by an ethics review board.
strongly disagreestrongly agree

For the following items, if you need additional space, you can type in the comments box (#35), which will expand to hold as much as you wish to say.

29. What types of web studies need to be reviewed?

30. Under what conditions would deception be acceptable in a web study?

31. Under what conditions is it acceptable to use ideas obtained from the web?

32. What precautions should an investigator take before posting a study or experiment to the web?

33. OTHER ETHICAL ISSUES IN WEB EXPERIMENTATION:

34. Should ethics review boards be allowed to prohibit politically sensitive or unpopular queries on the Internet? (For example, suppose an investigator wants to study the effects of political arguments in favor of physician-assisted suicide, and the review board rejects approval of the study because they disapprove of the topic. Under what conditions should such censorship by content prevail?)

35. COMMENTS: (The box will expand as you continue to type)

36. YOUR NAME (optional):

37. YOUR Country (optional):

Please check your answers. When you are done, push the button below.

Thank You!