 to you today about art, science, and ethics in communication study with a concentration on the latter. Most certainly there is art in communication. There's artistry in the way that messages are crafted, in the way that they are exchanged, and in the manner that they have impact on audiences. Like a visual artist who takes paint onto a blank canvas, a communicator combines words and images and adds to them a mood or an emotion by using a particular tone of voice, by varying his or her inflection and enunciation, and combining body language for good measure. Communication involves science as well. The scientific study of communication seeks to understand the functions, processes, and effects of human interactions in face to face and mediated contexts with a view to understand and possibly improve its effectiveness. The social scientific study of communication or communication research is systematic and planned. It adheres to a set of protocols and long established structures and procedures. It is theoretically and conceptually connected to a large body of knowledge, and while communication study may be initially driven by curiosity, it is methodical and aimed at addressing a particular problem or answering a specific question. Because communication is a complex behavior, so intimately intertwined with our personal and societal development, the expanse of communication study these days is so broad and the issues absolutely many. Hence the areas open to communication investigation can and do include violence, children and the family, migration, technology and its effects or impact, the economics of media, politics, political communication, drugs, civil-military relations, conflict and peace, human rights, gender issues, popular culture, health, public advocacy education, and the list goes on. Given that communication is a broad-ranged area, it is not surprising that its body of theory has been built up from various social sciences with psychology, anthropology, sociology, economics and political science being at its prominent roots. The birth and development of print, film, radio and television as mass media channels for information, entertainment and persuasion at the start of the 20th century led to so much speculation, fascination, argumentation and debate about their power to influence audiences. A major research concern in communication study is the audience. More specifically, communication effects on audiences, considering that technological developments have radically affected how we transmit and receive information, select and prioritize our needs and aspirations, form and maintain personal relationships, create and resolve social conflict. It is widely accepted, albeit quite cautiously and non-definitely, that exposure to communication, whether through interpersonal channels, through traditional mass media or the newer electronic media forms, leads to changes among its audiences. The extent of media impact, however, varies according to the particular theoretical perspective that one takes. It is in this context of studying audiences that I wish to focus on the ethical considerations in communication research. What is ethics? Ethics has to do with preserving and assuring that no harm is visited upon the participants who provide the information for the study, upon the researcher who undertakes the study. Moreover, that the research serves a greater good, the interest of a larger group or society itself. No harm, whether physical and psychological, real or virtual. Many writers have noted that ethical norms are so ubiquitous, such that they could be regarded as simple common sense. However, if accepting what is right and wrong were nothing more than common sense, then why are there so many ethical disputes and issues in our society? So let's talk about ethics in communication research and let's begin with a major phase in the cycle of scientific research. For me, the first phase is what we can call the research conceptualization stage. It's here that the problem is formulated, that objectives and goals are set, that the variables and measures are specified. The second phase is the data gathering or generation stage during which observations are made, interviews are conducted, tests administered. The third is the data reduction and analysis phase. And the fourth, the interpretation, reporting and utilization phase, which actually brings us back to the first phase. Throughout the research process, there are ethical considerations that one must consider. Let's consider the first phase, the data planning or conceptualization phase. This is where we do problem identification. Our problems of interest in communication verge from the controversial, sensitive and even upsetting. For example, in a family communication study, you as researcher are keenly interested in how dialogue, discussion and interaction between parents and children and among siblings may reduce or increase anxiety, a very relevant and important topic these days. But before you even completely conceptualize that problem, ask yourself these things. Do you have the qualifications to do such a study? Do you have a background in family therapy? Consider feasibility of access. Will there be families that will allow your entry? Then again, are you doing the study because your own family is a case study? Consider whether your intrusion into the scene for the purpose of research will aggravate the family situation even more. When it comes to reviewing the literature, a significant and important part of the conceptualization phase, consider the potential for plagiarism. As you go over various materials, you may become overwhelmed by the amount of studies to cite. Such exhaustion might lead to plagiarism. Researchers like us need to be constantly reminded, in fact, like a broken record, that we must fully acknowledge all content that belongs to others. But then again, what about using instruments that already exist? Let's say in your study of the internet use and political participation, you stumble into an instrument to measure civic engagement, which lo and behold, is so appropriate for your own study. What do you do? Do you merely tweak the instrument, then cite the original as reference? Is that sufficient? Will that suffice as recognition of intellectual rights of the other? Before you do that, please consider writing the original author and getting permission from him or her. When it comes to developing the methodology for conducting your study, there are several things to consider. Among them, the respondents. Who are you involving in your study? Are your research participants children under the age of 18? Maybe in their formative years between five and twelve? Will they not need somebody's permission before they are involved in yours? Then on the other extreme, are you involving people who are elderly? And what about those who have physical or mental challenges? Those who are in conditions of bereavement? Those who are prisoners? Consider access to them and the ethics of approaching them for purposes of your study. Then let's talk about sampling. And here there are issues beyond the use of probability versus non-probability techniques. Discussing that would take longer than this session. So I leave that for another time. Consider sample size. And that's a normal question. How big or how small can the sample be? In quantitative research, a mistake in computing a required sample size may actually lead to errors or bias when analyzing the data. Then again, there are the gatekeepers. As gatekeepers, they do control access to those whom you include in your sample. Gatekeepers often control access to participants whom we are interested in. For example, in an organization, the manager's control over access to employees. This has ethical implications because the power that such gatekeepers exercise over those individuals. For example, they may control what is granted or not to you, the researcher. They could coerce individuals into taking part in your research without your knowing it. And they may influence the nature of their responses. So consider these questions. Ask yourself, do I think that the participants are taking part voluntarily? Is their participation truly voluntary? How do I determine this? And if I am not sure about their voluntary participation, how can I take this into account when I analyze the data? Problems with gatekeepers affect the representativeness of the sample. Qualitative research designs are more likely to use non-probability sampling techniques, such as purposive sampling. And even quantitative research designs that use probability sampling can suffer from issues of reliability associated with gatekeepers. In the case of quantitative research designs using probability sampling, ask yourself whether the gatekeepers are giving you an accurate list of the population. Are they giving a complete list without missing out on potential participants? For example, those who can give a negative view of the organization. In the case of qualitative research designs using non-probability sampling, ask yourself whether gatekeepers are coercing participants. The right of refusal and bias impacts upon the data that you gather. People who refuse to take part in a study, which is incidentally the right, may introduce bias into a sample. You know very well that designing the sampling of a study takes a long and tedious process. However, during the fact of data gathering and your first question to a respondent is you may refuse to answer, you are actually inside praying that please don't, please cooperate because your non-participation thwarts my entire analytical design. So how do you nicely tell respondents, you have the right to say no, but please don't. In the case of conflicts of interest which can creep into a study without your being knowledgeable about it, consider whether your participants are your own relatives who can't say no to you, your subordinates who of course will not say no to you, or your own colleagues who are just being nice to you. Let's now go to the second phase of research, data gathering or construction phase and some of the ethical considerations that you might want to consider. First off and still related to sampling is the recruitment of research participants. Can you approach respondents in a public space? What impact will this have on the data that you collect? I'll tell you one story. In one of the research studies that I did using technology as a data gathering device, we had no problems recruiting participants even in a crowded and public lobby of a mall. Using technology and in this case a touch screen computer drew many respondents to our booths to such an extent that those who were not included in the sample wanted to participate in it. How do you politely tell them you're not included in our sampling scheme? Nobody's going to accept that right? So what we did the following day was to bring in two touch screens, one for the selected respondent and the other for those who insist in the research participation. They didn't know it but we threw away that data. Now when it comes to giving incentives, do you give incentives for data gathering? Is payment for participation in research ethical? Well, there are positives and negatives of it. In focus group discussions, participants are normally given a token gift whether these are in the forms of cash gift certificates. Now these are more or less allowable. But what about survey respondents? Do you pay them? How does that impact upon the data that they give you? What about when deception is involved especially in cases of observation when you cannot declare that you are actually there to observe data? What do you do? Well, invoke the greater good becomes problematic, right? Then there are issues of risks and hazards to you the researcher. How do you deal with weather and natural or physical hazards? What happens when the time for data gathering comes and there is a storm? What happens when you have to bring equipment with you when doing data gathering? And what happens when it is your own personal safety that is involved? One researcher who sought to study indigenous knowledge decided that her venue of study was with the book collots. The book collots are one of our indigenous peoples who live in remote areas of Luzon and coincidentally they are known as headhunters. Since the study involved collecting information about indigenous knowledge, how did this particular researcher deal with important issues on personal safety? Well, in her case, she came off with her head intact. There are also confidentiality issues. Remember when you have to deal with deception, how do you make a record of your observations without your respondents knowing it? Is filming doing photography of participants whether covert or otherwise permissible? Don't they have to sign a waiver? How do you deal with that? Then there are issues of confidentiality and privacy. I'll tell you another story. A student wanted to do the role of the elderly and family communication in situations of urbanizing communities. So the student set out, identified several families where there were elderly in the family. Having selected them, she visited them on a regular basis over a long period of time to such an extent that the elderly sought her company and in fact anticipated it. Until one time when the one who opened the door and let the researcher in was the daughter of the elderly family member and she said, I don't know what my mother is telling you but in my family we love our mother very much. However, because we have to go out and work, she may be offended by some of the things that we do. So can I please know what she is telling you and maybe we can give our own side. Now that perspective was not included in the original study but it did impact the reliability and validity of the study. Now let's go to the data reduction and analysis phase. In quantitative analysis, what do you do when you find out that there is purelessness in the data collected? There is one case when we discovered that the data returned to us were plucked out of the mango tree which means that they were all inventions of the data gatherer. We found out about it late in the game. Well, what do you do with spurious data? Do you throw them away? But if you throw them away that's going to reduce your data set. What do you do? Well, I advise you to throw them away. In qualitative analysis, how do you preserve the richness of the data, provide details that would require disclosure of information and put at risk the anonymity of the data source as well as the confidentiality that you had originally promised? During the last phase, the fourth phase of research, the interpretation, reporting and utilization phase, again there are issues of ethics that you should consider. How do you report your findings with complete honesty? If it is quantitative research, how do you use statistics so you do not misrepresent, misinform, mislead or lie? How do you give appropriate credit when using other people's works? This seems common place, but then again these are important considerations. I've talked to you about some of the issues in ethics and they are many and even more complex than the ones I have cited. I hope that this little review helps you as you do your own.