Skip to main content

Practical Ethics

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
Into the Wild: Beyond the Design Research Lab

Part of the book series: Studies in Applied Philosophy, Epistemology and Rational Ethics ((SAPERE,volume 48))

Abstract

As ethical issues become increasingly important and problematic in research, this chapter reflects on our own investigations into some of the ethical considerations involved in long-term research ‘in the wild’. In particular, we consider two relevant issues: the effect of a long-term relationship with a community, and the delineation and relevance of ‘practical’ ethics in the process. What becomes clear from our interrogation of the data is that issues of responsibility, including those of how we identify what our responsibilities might be; who holds them; what they entail, and how we discharge them are matters of the negotiated order. In a context where research relationships ‘in the wild’ are predicated on lasting commitments, they are not, and cannot be, determined by the researchers alone. They evolve over time and in delicate relation to the needs and desires of our fellow research partners and participants—this is what ‘practical ethics’ entails.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 139.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Hardcover Book
USD 179.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

References and Further Reading

  • Abras, C., Maloney-Krichmar, D., & Preece, J. (2004). User-centered design. In W. Bainbridge (Ed.), Encyclopedia of human-computer interaction (Vol. 37(4), pp. 445–456). Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bardzell, J., & Bardzell, S. (2013). What is critical about critical design? In Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 3297–3306). ACM.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bardzell, S. (2010). Feminist HCI: Taking stock and outlining an agenda for design. In Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 1301–1310). ACM.

    Google Scholar 

  • Becker, L. C., & Becker, C. B. (Eds.). (2003). A history of Western ethics. Psychology Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Benford, S., Greenhalgh, C., Anderson, B., Jacobs, R., Golembewski, M., Jirotka, M., et al. (2015). The ethical implications of HCI’s turn to the cultural. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction (TOCHI), 22(5), 24.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Berges, S. (2015). A feminist perspective on virtue ethics. Springer.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bødker, S. (2000). Scenarios in user-centred design—setting the stage for reflection and action. Interacting with Computers, 13(1), 61–75.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Brannigan, A. (2017). The rise and fall of social psychology: An iconoclast’s guide to the use and misuse of the experimental method. Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bratteteig, T., & Wagner, I. (2014). Disentangling participation: Power and decision-making in participatory design. Springer.

    Google Scholar 

  • Brey, P. (2010). Values in technology and disclosive computer ethics. In The Cambridge handbook of information and computer ethics (pp. 41–58).

    Google Scholar 

  • Brown, B., Reeves, S., & Sherwood, S. (2011). Into the wild: challenges and opportunities for field trial methods. In Proceedings of the 2011 Annual Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI ‘11) (pp. 1657–1666). New York, NY, USA: ACM.

    Google Scholar 

  • Brown, B., Weilenmann, A., McMillan, D., & Lampinen, A. (2016, May). Five provocations for ethical HCI research. In Proceedings of the 2016 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 852–863). ACM.

    Google Scholar 

  • Crabtree, A., Chamberlain, A., Grinter, R. E., Jones, M., Rodden, T., & Rogers, Y. (2013). Introduction to the special issue of “The Turn to The Wild”. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction (TOCHI), 20(3), 13.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • De Ruyter, B., & Aarts, E. (2004). Ambient intelligence: Visalising the future. In Proceedings of AVI ’04, Gallipoli, Italy. ACM Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dunne, A., & Raby, F. (2001). Design noir: The secret life of electronic objects. Springer Science & Business Media.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dunne, A., & Raby, F. (2013). Speculative everything: Design, fiction, and social dreaming. MIT Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Edmonds, D. (2013). Would you kill the fat man?: The trolley problem and what your answer tells us about right and wrong. Princeton University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Eriksson, M., Niitamo, V.-P., & Kulkki, S. (2005). State-of-the-art in utilizing Living Labs approach to user-centric ICT innovation—A European approach.

    Google Scholar 

  • Følstad, A. (2008). Living labs for innovation and development of information and communication technology: A literature review. The Electronic Journal for Virtual Organizations and Networks, 99–131.

    Google Scholar 

  • Foot, P. (2002). Virtues and vices and other essays in moral philosophy. Oxford University Press on Demand.

    Google Scholar 

  • Friedman, B., & Kahn, P. H., Jr. (2003). Human values, ethics, and design. In The human-computer interaction handbook (pp. 1177–1201).

    Google Scholar 

  • Haddon, L. (2007). Roger Silverstone’s legacies: Domestication. New Media & Society, 9(1), 25–32.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hammersley, M. (2009). Against the ethicists: On the evils of ethical regulation. International Journal of Social Research Methodology, 12(3), 211–225.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Harding, M., Finney, J., Davies, N., Rouncefield, M., & Hannon, J. (2013, September). Experiences with a social travel information system. In Proceedings of the 2013 ACM international joint conference on Pervasive and ubiquitous computing (pp. 173–182). ACM.

    Google Scholar 

  • Intille, S., Larson, K., Beaudin, J. S., Nawyn, J., Tapia, E. M., & Kaushik, P. (2005). A living laboratory for the design and evaluation of ubiquitous computing technologies. In Proceedings of CHI ‘05. ACM press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kensing, F., & Blomberg, J. (1998). Participatory design: Issues and concerns. JCSCW, 7(3–4), 167–185.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lehtonen, T. K. (2003). The domestication of new technologies as a set of trials. Journal of Consumer Culture, 3(3), 363–385.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • MacIntyre, A. (1988). Short history of ethics: A history of moral philosophy from the homeric age to the twentieth century.

    Google Scholar 

  • McInerny, R. M. (1997). Ethica Thomistica: The moral philosophy of Thomas Aquinas. CUA Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Moore, G. E., & Baldwin, T. (1993). Principia ethica. Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mumford, E. (1995). Effective systems design and requirements analysis: The ETHICS approach.

    Google Scholar 

  • O’Connor, J. (2012). The trolley method of moral philosophy. Essays in Philosophy, 13(1), Article 14.

    Google Scholar 

  • Randall, D. (2003). Domestic settings and new technology: A case study. In R. Harper (Ed.), Inside the smart home. London: Springer.

    Google Scholar 

  • Schuurman, D., Evens, T., & De Marez, L. (2009). A Living lab research approach for mobile TV. In Proceedings of the Seventh European Interactive Television Conference. New York: ACM press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Silverstone, R. (2005). 12 Domesticating domestication. Reflections on the life of. In Domestication of media and technology (p. 229).

    Google Scholar 

  • Singer, P. (2011a). The expanding circle. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Singer, P. (2011b). Practical ethics. Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Strathern, M. (2000). Audit cultures: Anthropological studies in accountability, ethics, and the academy. Psychology Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Taylor, N., Cheverst, K., Wright, P., & Olivier, P. (2013, April). Leaving the wild: Lessons from community technology handovers. In Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 1549–1558). ACM.

    Google Scholar 

  • Turner, R. (1970). “Words, utterances, activities”. In Jack D. Douglas (Ed.), Understanding everyday life: Towards a reconstruction of sociological knowledge (pp. 169–87). Chicago: Aldine Publishing.

    Google Scholar 

  • Turner, R. (1974). (Ed.) Ethnomethodology. Harmondsworth: Penguin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Verbeek, P. P. (2006). Materializing morality: Design ethics and technological mediation. Science, Technology and Human Values, 31(3), 361–380.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Verbeek, P.-P. (2008). Morality in design: Design ethics and the morality of technological artifacts. In Philosophy and design (pp. 91–103). Springer Netherlands.

    Google Scholar 

  • Waycott, J., Munteanu, C., Davis, H., Thieme, A., Moncur, W., McNaney, R., Vines, J., & Branham, S. (2016). Ethical encounters in human-computer interaction. In Proceedings of the 2016 CHI Conference Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 3387–3394). ACM.

    Google Scholar 

  • Whitbeck, C. (2011). Ethics in engineering practice and research. Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Winner, L. (1980). Do artifacts have politics? Daedalus, 121–136.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wood, A. (2011). Humanity as end in itself. In D. Parfit (Ed.), On what matters (Vol. 2, pp. 58–82). Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Nick Race .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2020 Springer Nature Switzerland AG

About this chapter

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this chapter

Race, N., Randall, D., Rouncefield, M., Slack, R. (2020). Practical Ethics. In: Chamberlain, A., Crabtree, A. (eds) Into the Wild: Beyond the Design Research Lab. Studies in Applied Philosophy, Epistemology and Rational Ethics, vol 48. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-18020-1_9

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-18020-1_9

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-18018-8

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-18020-1

  • eBook Packages: EngineeringEngineering (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics