Open Praxis, vol. 8 issue 2, April–June 2016, pp.

93–109  (ISSN 2304-070X)

2016 Open Education Global Conference Selected Papers

A Framework for the Ethics of Open Education

Robert Farrow
The Open University (United Kingdom)
[email protected]

Abstract
What difference does openness make to the ethics of teaching and research? This paper approaches this
question both from the perspective of research into the use of open educational resources (OER) in teaching
and learning. An outline of the nature and importance of ethics in education research is provided before the
basic principles of research ethics are examined through a discussion of traditional guidance provided by
three UK research governance bodies: the Economics and Social Research Council; the British Education
Research Association; and the British Psychological Society. The importance and foundation of institutional
approval for research activities is analysed with several examples of the differences made by openness. It is
argued that openness by its nature provokes particular issues for education researchers. A framework for
understanding openness in education is then proposed based on basic meta-ethical positions (deontological;
consequentialist; virtue). Used as a tool, the framework attempts to retain relevance in a variety of scenarios
without requiring a dogmatic vision of openness (e.g. an insistence on open licensing). This framework is
then evaluated in the context of the OER Research Hub project, which developed guidance for others in the
form of an ‘ethics manual’ and online learning provided through the OER Research Hub’s ‘Open Research’
course hosted on P2PU’s School of Open. Use of the framework is intended to contribute to a better
understanding of professional ethics for open practitioners.

Keywords: open education, research ethics, professionalism, data, pedagogy, MOOC, OER

The Emerging Open Paradigm

There is widespread recognition that the move to digitized, online and freely accessible learning
resources brings profound ethical challenges. New information technologies continue to change the
way we teach and interact. The philosopher of technology Luciano Floridi has suggested that “the
information society has been brought about by the fastest growing technology in history [. . .] No
previous generation has ever been exposed to such an extraordinary acceleration of technical power
over reality, with corresponding social changes and ethical responsibilities” (Floridi, 2011, p. 4). New
technologies bring new forms of human interaction, requiring fresh engagement with their ethical
import.
This paper proposes a framework that focuses on the ethical significance of a particular group of
educational technologies usually referred to as open education. A range of cultures, behaviours,
practices and technologies from educational contexts may be described as ‘open’, including access
to education or published research, policies, teaching methods, software, data sets and other
educational resources. Open universities, now commonly found all around the world, have massively
expanded access to education. Over the last decade—primarily in the form of Massive Open Online
Courses (MOOC) and Open Educational Resources (OER)—the open education movement has
expanded opportunities for education worldwide.
“OER are teaching, learning, and research resources that reside in the public domain or have been
released under an intellectual property license that permits their free use and re-purposing by others.
Open educational resources include full courses, course materials, modules, textbooks, streaming videos,
tests, software, and any other tools, materials, or techniques used to support access to knowledge.”
(Hewlett Foundation, undated.)

Reception date: 7 February 2016  •  Acceptance date: 12 April 2016

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5944/openpraxis.8.2.291
94 Robert Farrow

OER and MOOC encourage the production and sharing of high-quality educational materials at
minimal cost. They represent a potential solution to many issues facing educators around the world
and have attracted significant media interest around the world. In a time of austerity and fiscal
uncertainty, openness has re-entered the popular consciousness and universities take steps towards
integration of the ‘open’ model of education or learners take individual initiative to use them as an
alternative to accruing debt through formal education. Open education has always identified with a
strong ethical impulse, with many advocates directly inspired by what they see as a moral mission.
“When educational materials can be electronically copied and transferred around the world at almost no
cost, we have a greater ethical obligation than ever before to increase the reach of opportunity. When
people can connect with others nearby or in distant lands at almost no cost to ask questions, give
answers, and exchange ideas, the moral imperative to meaningfully enable these opportunities weighs
profoundly. We cannot in good conscience allow this poverty of educational opportunity to continue when
educational provisions are so plentiful, and when their duplication and distribution costs so little.” (Caswell,
Henson, Jensen & Wiley, 2008)

The moral mission of open education has also found a touchstone in international human rights
legislation. The Paris Declaration on OER (UNESCO, 2012) builds on the previous ten years of
OER advocacy as well as article 26 of the United Nations Universal Declaration on Human Rights
(United Nations, 1948) and article 13.1 of The International Covenant on Economic, Social and
Cultural Rights (United Nations, 1966) in recognition of “the right of everyone to education”.
While there are also prudential rather than explicitly moral motivations for adopting openness—an
educator might move to using open textbooks with their students for purely pragmatic reasons, for
instance—for many practitioners the ethical dimensions of open education are crucial because of
a commitment to expanding access to education. Given this, there is remarkably little written about
the ethics of open education. A review of sixty-eight empirical studies, systematic reviews and
reports on MOOC (Rolfe, 2015) suggests there is “a paucity of literature” addressing the socio-
ethical dimensions, noting that “many of the articles published provide empirical evidence showing
that both forms of MOOC offer opportunities to learn and connect across geographical boundaries,
yet we are at a point where social inclusion is polarised toward the more privileged” (Rolfe, 2015,
p. 65).
Open education often does not live up to its own vision: in practice, unequal access to
communications technology, unequal distribution of basic study skills, and unavailability of resources
in certain languages mean that open approaches can act as a force for exclusion rather than
inclusion (Emmanuel, 2013; Laurillard, 2014; Perryman, 2013). As openness increasingly enters
the mainstream there is concern that the more radical ethical aspirations of the open movement
are becoming secondary. Wiley (2015) for instance argues for a ‘deeper’ understanding of open
ethics as a form of being with an ethic of care and sharing rather than a set of duties (such as a
requirement to use open licensing). This paper claims to define neither a professional ethics of open
nor a ‘deeper’ ethics of open. Rather, the intention is to provide a framework that will make it easier
to build and identify these.

Professional ethics in education research

Ethics is now a fundamental part of institutional research practice, but this is a relatively recent state
of affairs. Before World War II there were no internationally recognized standards for research
involving human subjects. As is well known, physicians working for the Nazi regime performed acts
of experimentation on many human beings including forced sterilization, hypothermia, trauma, the
ingestion and topical application of noxious substances, pathological infections, and amputations,

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among others. These experiments are all the more horrific because of the lack of any free consent
given by those experimented upon. At the military tribunal for war crimes known as the “Doctors’
Trial” (United States Adjutant General’s Department, 1947) several of the defendants argued that
the experiments carried out differed little from those carried out by other countries, and in any case
the lack of international legislation distinguishing legal and illegal research meant that there was no
grounds for disputing the legitimacy of their actions. In 1947, in the aftermath of war crimes trials,
the Nuremberg Code (HHS, 2005) was produced to describe the conditions under which research
involving human subjects could be considered ethical by setting out key principles that should inform
research activity. Foremost among these principles is the idea of the informed consent of participants
being fundamental to ethical practice. But also conveyed is the idea that experiments should be
oriented towards the good of society; that harm and risk should be minimized; that researchers
should be scientifically qualified; and that any party has the right to terminate the experiment at any
point (ibid.).
Despite being very close to contemporary legislation governing research, the Nuremberg Code
was never made legally binding. Further examples of unethical research emerged in the 20th century,
some of which remain quite contentious. For instance, the notorious Tuskagee experiments continued
in the USA until 1972, where physicians withheld treatment of more than 600 syphilitic African
American men in order to study the progression and spread of the disease (CDC, 2013). Others
are less clear-cut, such as the “Tearoom Trade” ethnographic study that involved a sympathetic
researcher posing a voyeur in public toilets in order to gather data on illicit homosexual activity
without the consent of the participants (Humphreys, 1970). The 1970s saw much debate on expected
standards in research, and by the end of the decade the Belmont Report (1979) set out the principles
of ethical research that still acts as the basis for ethical experimental research.1
In practice, ethics matters across the entirety of the research process, including design of the
process and instruments; sampling; data collection; through to dissemination. All ethical guidance
offered to researchers is predicated on the assumption that the researcher is in a position to exercise
control over the research process as well as any smaller interventions that take place as part of
the research. The responsibilities of researchers are also not limited only to their own actions, since
we also expect a reasonable assessment of anticipated risk and consequences that might follow
from an intervention. Researchers can also be thought to have ethical obligations for situations that
are entirely out of their control.
The ethical guidelines for research involving human subjects offered by different professional
bodies share the common origin outlined above. This can be illustrated by comparing advice from
different professional bodies that advise researchers. Taking the example of the United Kingdom:
the main bodies providing such advice are the UK Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC,
2015), the British Educational Research Association (BERA, 2014), and the British Psychological
Society (BPS, 2010). Table 1 categorises some of the advice given according to the underlying key
principles.

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Table 1: Comparison of ethical research advice, UK professional bodies (categorized according to

underlying principle)

Principle ESRC (2015) BERA (2014) BPS (2010)

Respect for Research participants Individuals should be treated Adherence to the concept of
participant should take part fairly, sensitively, with dignity, moral rights is an essential
autonomy voluntarily, free from any and within an ethic of respect component of respect for the
coercion or undue and freedom from prejudice dignity of persons. Rights to
influence, and their regardless of age, gender, privacy, self-determination,
rights, dignity and (when sexuality, race, ethnicity, personal liberty and natural
possible) autonomy class, nationality, cultural justice are of particular
should be respected and identity, partnership status, importance to psychologists,
appropriately protected. faith, disability, political belief and they have a responsibility
(ESRC, 2015, p. 4) or any other significant to protect and promote these
difference. (BERA, 2011, §9) rights in their research
activities. (BPS, 2010 p. 8)

Avoid harm / Research should be Researchers must recognize Harm to research participants
minimize risk worthwhile and provide that participants may must be avoided. Where risks
value that outweighs any experience distress or arise as an unavoidable and
risk or harm. discomfort in the research integral element of the
Researchers should aim process and must take all research, robust risk
to maximise the benefit necessary steps to reduce assessment and
of the research and the sense of intrusion and to management protocols
minimise potential risk of put them at their ease. They should be developed and
harm to participants and must desist immediately from complied with. Normally, the
researchers. All potential any actions, ensuing from risk of harm must be no
risk and harm should be the research process, that greater than that encountered
mitigated by robust cause emotional or other in ordinary life, i.e.
precautions. (ESRC, harm. (BERA, 2011, §20) participants should not be
2015, p. 4) exposed to risks greater than
or additional to those to
which they are exposed in
their normal lifestyles. (BPS,
2010, p. 11)

Full disclosure Research staff and Researchers who judge that This Code expects all
participants should be the effect of the agreements psychologists to seek to
given appropriate they have made with supply as full information as
information about the participants, on confidentiality possible to those taking part
purpose, methods and and anonymity, will allow the in their research, recognising
intended uses of the continuation of illegal that if providing all of that
research, what their behaviour, which has come information at the start of a
participation in the to light in the course of the person’s participation may
research entails and research, must carefully not be possible for
what risks and benefits, consider making disclosure methodological reasons [. . .]
if any, are involved. to the appropriate authorities. If a proposed research study
(ESRC, 2015, p. 4) (BERA, 2011, §29) involves deception, it should
be designed in such a way
that it protects the dignity and
autonomy of the participants.
(BPS, 2010, p. 24)

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 A Framework for the Ethics of Open Education 97

Principle ESRC (2015) BERA (2014) BPS (2010)

Privacy & Data Individual research The confidential and All records of consent,
Security participant and group anonymous treatment of including audio-recordings,
preferences regarding participants’ data is should be stored in the same
anonymity should be considered the norm for the secure conditions as
respected and participant conduct of research. research data, with due
requirements concerning [. . .] Researchers must regard to the confidentiality
the confidential nature of comply with the legal and anonymity protocols of
information and personal requirements in relation to the research which will often
data should be the storage and use of involve the storage of
respected. (ESRC, 2015, personal data as set down personal identity data in a
p. 4) by the Data Protection Act location separate from the
(1998) and any subsequent linked data. (BPS, 2010,
similar acts. (BERA, 2011, p. 20)
§26)

Integrity Research should be Subject to any limitations Research should be

designed, reviewed and imposed by agreements to designed, reviewed and
undertaken to ensure protect confidentiality and conducted in a way that
recognised standards of anonymity, researchers must ensures its quality, integrity
integrity are met, and make their data and methods and contribution to the
quality and transparency amenable to reasonable development of knowledge
are assured. (ESRC, external scrutiny. The and understanding. Research
2015, p. 4) assessment of the quality of that is judged within a
the evidence supporting any research community to be
inferences is an especially poorly designed or conducted
important feature of any wastes resources and
research and must be open devalues the contribution of
to scrutiny. (BERA, 2011, the participants. At worst it
§46) can lead to misleading
information being
promulgated and can have
the potential to cause harm.
(BPS, 2010, p. 9)

Independence The independence of The right of researchers The ethics review process
research should be clear, independently to publish the should be independent of the
and any conflicts of findings of their research [is] research itself [. . .] this
interest or partiality linked to the obligation on principle highlights the need
should be explicit. researchers to ensure that to avoid conflicts of interest
(ESRC, 2015, p. 4) their findings are placed in between researchers and
the public domain and within those reviewing the ethics
reasonable reach of protocol, and between
educational practitioners and reviewers and organisational
policy makers, parents, governance structures. (BPS,
pupils and the wider public. 2010, p. 27)
(BERA, 2011, §40)

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Principle ESRC (2015) BERA (2014) BPS (2010)

Informed Informed consent entails Researchers must take the The consent of participants in
Consent giving sufficient steps necessary to ensure research, whatever their age
information about the that all participants in the or competence, should
research and ensuring research understand the always be sought, by means
that there is no explicit or process in which they are to appropriate to their age and
implicit coercion . . . so be engaged, including why competence level. For
that prospective their participation is children under 16 years of
participants can make an necessary, how it will be age and for other persons
informed and free used and how and to whom where capacity to consent
decision on their possible it will be reported. Social may be impaired the
involvement [. . .] The networking and other on-line additional consent of parents
consent forms should be activities, including their or those with legal
signed off by the video-based environments, responsibility for the
research participants to present challenges for individual should normally
indicate consent. (ESRC, consideration of consent also be sought. (BPS, 2010,
2015, p. 4) issues and the participants p. 16)
must be clearly informed that
their participation and
interactions are being
monitored and analysed for
research. (BERA, 2011, §11)

While not a full systematic review, this comparison makes clear the great deal of overlap between
the underlying principles. Similar guidance is given by other bodies around the world, including the
federal regulations concerning the protection of human research subjects published by the USA
Department of Human and Health Services (HHS, 2009). These similarities are best understood as
resulting from a shared genealogy influenced by Nuremberg and Belmont. Researchers working in
the USA must typically comply with these principles, and obtain the approval of an Institutional
Review Board (IRB) for research involving human subjects. The processes for institutional approval
of research involving human subjects are standardised, typically involving some form of risk
assessment checklist, which shows that the advice outlined above, has been considered and
appropriate actions taken.
Because these principles have a shared genealogy (as outlined above) they are extremely similar
at institutions throughout the world: to comply with institutional rules researchers need to have their
proposal approved by an expert panel who consider the same key principles. All international
signatories to the Declaration of Helsinki (World Medical Association, 2013) subscribe to a similar
process for all research involving human subjects, and the Declaration acts as the basis for human
research ethics worldwide.2
Since these are principles rather than specific acts of guidance, they have often been interpreted
in accord with new technological advances. For instance, the Association of Internet Research
(AOIR, 2012) has published ethical recommendations regarding the use of the internet in research
which reflects the affordances of working with large data sets, scraping information, curating and
sharing information online, and so on. But even in this recent advice there is no mention of the
importance of openness as an approach.

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Research Beyond the Institution

The processes and principles described above are typically applied in institutional contexts through
the mechanisms by which approval is offered to research activities such as collecting information
through surveys; interviews; using data about individuals or groups; acceptable professional
standards for analysis; and strategies for dissemination. However, research activities are increasingly
taking place outside institutions using open, publicly available data and technologies to collect and
analyze data as well as disseminate findings. Following Weller (2013), I will characterize extra-
institutional open research as ‘guerrilla research’. For activities of this type, no further permissions
are usually needed from research participants, as data used is already publically available and
openly licensed. ‘Guerrilla’ researchers do not typically collect primary data. Rather, their contribution
is in the application of new methods to legacy data, or combining existing data sets in novel ways.
Research of this type may be characterized as agile and quick to initiate and complete with a minimal
business case. Unfettered by institutional or disciplinary rules, guerrilla researchers can explore
alterative funding models (such as crowdsourcing) and alternative forms of dissemination (such as
through blogs, social media, infographics and data visualizations). Examples of research of this type
include:
• Jordan (2014) used openly available and crowd-sourced data on MOOC enrolment and
completion to perform a trends analysis using linear regression. This study showed that the
average completion rate for MOOC was 10%, and that the massive enrolment seen in some
early MOOC was falling as more courses became available. The data from the study was
made openly available to others to corroborate results or perform alternative analyses. A blog
post about the work went viral and became the de facto citation for MOOC completion rates
(Weller, 2014, p. 14).
• In the United Kingdom, the Freedom of Information Act (2000) provides for public access to
information held by public authorities on the basis that “[o]penness is fundamental to the
political health of a modern state” (Cabinet Office, 1997). Open data about government can
form the basis of research enquiry. In 2009, Tony Hirst—a lecturer at The Open University,
UK—created a Google Map which cross referenced open data about the expenses claims
of Members of Parliament (MPs) with information about the distance of their constituency
to London. The map highlighted MPs who claimed disproportionately more than others in
a similar location and was picked up by national newspaper The Guardian (Arthur, 2009)
leading to further maps and explorations of data. This work had a high impact despite being
quick to initiate.
• Another example is provided by Coal Run, Ohio. A mapping mash-up which cross-referenced
city boundaries, water supply lines, and house occupancy by race showed that almost all the
white households in Coal Run had water service while all but a few black homes did not. On
the basis of this study residents successfully sued Zanesville and Muskingham County for
$11 million in 2008 (Burtman, 2009).
• In 2013, social network Facebook carried out a study into ‘emotional contagion’. To find out
whether the psychological states of its users can be manipulated showed 689,003 users either
only ‘positive’ or ‘negative’ status updates to ascertain whether this would affect their mood.
The researchers found experimental evidence that emotional contagion occurs without
direct interaction between people and without cues (Kramer, Guillory & Hancock, 2014).
The experiment remains controversial because no consent was sought from the unwitting

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100 Robert Farrow

participants: it was argued that anyone who holds a Facebook account signs up to the terms
and conditions of using Facebook and thus has given implied consent. This threshold would
be unlikely to be high enough for most institutional review boards—especially given (i) the
intention to cause psychological stress, and (ii) the impossibility of a small research team
knowing what impact the study would have on such a large sample. Indeed, though the study
involved researchers from Cornell University their IRB covered only the analysis of data and
not its collection. Furthermore, because the work was for a private company it was believed
that different ethical expectations apply: “[b]ecause this experiment was conducted by Face-
book, Inc. for internal purposes, the Cornell University IRB determined that the project did
not fall under Cornell’s Human Research Protection Program” (Verma, 2014).
While the dependence of such activities on open tools and technologies might be thought of as the
emergence of a distinctive new discipline, the distinction between institutional and ‘guerrilla’ research
should be thought of as a spectrum rather than a binary. Many institutional researchers work with
open data sets, for example. But the correct balance between traditional and ‘guerrilla’ research
activities has not been established, and these activities are often not recognized as valid by
institutions. It should also be noted that openness extends research opportunities beyond the
academy to people who may not have had a formal training in research ethics.
What these examples show is that quite powerful insights can be generated by making different
or creative use of available data; but also that the insights they provide can be charged with ethical
significance. Given that ‘guerrilla research’ can uncover socially important information, a case could
be made that research of this type should be supported through, for instance, facilitating data mining
and widely teaching the skills needed to curate, clean and analyze information. However, the
examples given are rather selective and there remain several issues around this kind of research.
Whether conducted in public or private institutions, unconventional research activities (and their
outputs) are often not institutionally recognized. This can lead to a lack of institutional guidance or
an unwillingness to endorse such activities, and a subsequent reluctance for faculty to engage with
them. Furthermore, it can be unclear who owns the intellectual produced in ‘guerrilla research’ and
this can also pose a barrier (though open licensing could potentially help by clarifying permissions).
While openly licensed data can be legally used according to the license provided, it should not
be assumed that everything that can be done with the data is also ethically justified. When using
data beyond its original study consent might not qualify as ‘informed’ and it becomes especially
important to explain open licensing and open dissemination to ensure that consent is informed.
Another risk with the use of third party datasets is the lack of connection between the researcher
and the original context that produced the data and the risk of misinterpretation or misunderstanding
of context. Longo & Drazen (2016, p. 276) express concern that “people who had nothing to do
with the design and execution of the study but use another group’s data for their own ends” could
be seen as “research parasites” who try to subvert or appropriate the activities of others. This could
potentially act as a barrier to openly sharing, or encourage researchers not to release data unless
they believe it has no more potential value.
These examples demonstrate that clearer guidance is needed for educators and researchers
working within open education. Yet, by the very nature of openness, it is extremely difficult to
prescribe appropriate actions because of the diverse contexts of open educational practices. What
is required, then, is a framework which can accommodate diverse elements, identify ethical elements
and present them in a way that aids understanding, reflection, and practical decision-making. The
proposed framework proceeds by delineating three key areas from moral philosophy.

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A Framework for the Ethics of Open Education

Ethics is the attempt to arrive at understandings of human behavior and values that are both
systematic and action-guiding. Moral philosophers typically distinguish the study of different elements
of ethics into three subdomains: normative ethics; applied ethics; and meta-ethics. ‘Normative ethics’
is concerned with actions and their moral value, and is prescriptive in the sense that it attempts to
establish how people should behave, which rules they should follow, and which beliefs and values
one should have. Normative ethics attempts to guide actions according to some standard, rule or
principle. Note that this is not guided by empirical norms, or social mores: ‘normative’ here does
not refer to ‘the norm’ in terms of what is held socially acceptable but rather to some standard of
correctness that can be used to judge the rightness of an action. Another way to put this is to say
that, unlike an ethnographic description, normative ethics is concerned with what should be the
case rather than what is. Three main normative theories—deontological, consequentialist and
virtue—are further discussed below.
‘Applied ethics’ is used to denote those studies that attempt the practical application of a normative
theory, i.e. how can we apply the moral principles that have been identified consistently and
concretely. Because applied ethics is concerned with real world problems a great deal of specificity
is typical of the enquiries. Research ethics, professional ethics, business ethics, environmental
ethics, the ethics of biotechnology and medical ethics, among others, fall under this category. It may
be feasible that open education develops a professional code of ethics. However, as shown in the
preceding discussion of ‘guerrilla’ research and the contextual qualities of openness, there are
reasons not to expect this in the short-term as the contexts of open practices are so diverse and
unpredictable.
The third area of moral philosophy is meta-ethics. Whereas the first two were concerned with the
rightness (or wrongness) of specific actions, meta-ethics is concerned instead with the meaning,
use and significance of moral language like ‘good’, ‘bad’, ‘right’, ‘wrong’ and so forth. Meta-ethical
questions are more wide-ranging than they might first seem, and meta-ethics overlaps with a number
of different aspects of philosophy, including epistemology and metaphysics. In addition, meta-ethics
include wider theoretical questions like whether moral judgements should be considered subjective
or objective, or whether ethical judgements result from ultimately selfish or altruistic motives. It is
important to note that meta-ethical theories do not attempt to guide actions; they are not normative.
Rather, they are attempts to reconstruct and make sense of our experience of morality and moral
intuition by analysing our moral experiences.
The framework is oriented towards normative ethics in order to focus on bringing out normative
conclusions in relation to open education research.
• Deontological theories emphasize moral obligation and the rule-based nature of morality.
Religious ethics are typically deontological, for example, with clear rules about acceptable
and unacceptable behavior. There are also many important non-religious deontological
theories which endorse respect for individuals and their rational autonomy. In open research
this is most closely identified with the need to respect participants, learners, and colleagues.
Informed consent is related to respect for persons.
• Consequentialist theories (notably, Utilitarianism) understand morality as a matter of
bringing about the right consequences; to do what is objectively ‘right’ in terms of the wider
context rather than what is necessarily best for oneself. There are differing theories within
consequentialism about which outcomes should be thought desirable. Avoiding harm and
minimizing risk is a clear example of a consequentialist consideration, but acting to bring about
good consequences—such as through learning and dissemination—is equally important.

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102 Robert Farrow

• Virtue theories (derived from Plato and Aristotle) emphasize the importance of virtue,
character and experience in acting ethically and in accordance with one’s nature. Virtue
theorists hold that good judgment and excellence in ethics is a matter of practical wisdom
(phronêsis). Integrity and independence can be understood as virtues in this sense.
‘Openness’ itself could also be understood as a virtue (minimally in the sense of ‘full
disclosure’ but perhaps as a wider ‘ethic of open’).
These theories are compared in Table 2.

Table 2: Summary of main normative ethical theories

Normative Definition Focus Strengths Weaknesses

Theory of ‘good’

Deontological Fulfillment or Responsibility, · Avoids overly · Possible conflicts

discharge of intention & duty demanding aspects of between different
moral consequentialism duties and rights
obligations · Accounting for cross- · Outcome ‘blindness’
cultural moral intuitions · Inflexibility: rules do
· Reflects our moral not change according
intuitions and captures to context
the sense in which
morality ‘binds’ us like a
law
· Clear moral boundaries

Consequentialist Acting to Consequences · Captures ‘objective’ · Endorsement of

promote and outcomes sense of morality counter-intuitive or
best · Can incorporate objectionable
outcomes multiple perspectives outcomes
· A practical approach to · Issues surrounding
ethical problems metrics
· No necessary link
with intention behind
actions (which seem
in themselves to be
significant)

Virtue Ethics Flourishing Individual · No complex procedure · Disagreement:

(eudemonia) character and of decision-making. It ‘virtuous’ people may
‘well-being’ trusts that a ‘virtuous’ not agree on the right
person will make good thing to do
Developing
moral choices. · Problems with
practical
· Recognises morality as proposed link
wisdom
an holistic, between virtue and
(phronêsis)
developmental process flourishing
· Emphasis on enjoying · Struggles to
life and it being good to accommodate value
live virtuously plurality
· Considers life · Promotes self-
experiences as a whole centredness or
· Linked to personal egoism
development

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 A Framework for the Ethics of Open Education 103

This paper proposes that these three theories can act as a useful anchor for thinking through ethical
issues ‘in the open’; that is, contexts where openness is emphasized and/or without institutional
support. For the purposes of this framework we will focus on the three positions, here described in
everyday language.
Table 3: Uncompleted Framework

Duties & Outcomes Personal

Responsibilities (consequentialist) Development
(deontological) (virtue)

Respect for participant autonomy

Avoid harm / minimize risk

Full disclosure

Privacy & data security

Integrity

Independence

Informed Consent

Applying the Framework: OER Research Hub

By way of illustration, the framework (table 3) will be examined through consideration of ethical
issues in the OER Research Hub project. OER Research Hub (2015) was a research project funded
by The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation to provide and aggregate leading research into the
impact of open educational resources across higher education, further education, schooling and
informal learning. In OER Research Hub a broad view of potential impact was taken so as avoid
prescription about the possible direct or indirect results of OER implementation. The project
methodology involved a collaboration program with high profile OER projects provided opportunities
to reach out to a targeted international OER community engaged in establishing new OER practice
and dissemination activities. In order to provide a universal structure for researching diverse contexts
of OER application a series of eleven hypotheses about OER were addressed across the project.
Evidence was then gathered for and against the hypotheses throughout the research. Headline
findings from the project are summarized in the evidence report (de los Arcos et al., 2014) and the
data report (de los Arcos et al., 2015). Each hypothesis reflected claims commonly made about the
impact of OER. Supplementary to the evidence acquired from these targeted collaborations the
project also curated secondary evidence from research literature. The data was used to generate
a number of visualizations, and to map evidence (OER Impact Map, 2014) as well as writing more
traditional quantitative and qualitative scientific papers.
There are several reasons why this project is interesting from the perspective of ethics and
openness. OER Research Hub was committed to exploring openness in practice and endeavored
to be as open as possible. The goal of the project was to research open education through open
methods while also determining what kind of methods might be considered ‘open’. There are several
aspects of this project that are important from the perspective of an open ethics:
• Although most of the research was conducted in the USA, the project worked with more than
7,000 research participants over 150 countries. This required sensitivity to a wide range of
cultural norms and expectations;

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104 Robert Farrow

• As a university research project involving human subjects, OER Research Hub was subject
to the regulations of The Open University, UK. This necessitated ethical considerations in
line with traditional expectations: compliance with UK Data Protection Act (1998) as well as
relevant codes in other countries, such as and the USA’s Protection of Human Subjects (HHS,
2009). In addition, all data collection activities complied with The Open University’s ‘Ethics
Principles for Research Involving Human Participants’ and ‘Code of Practice’;
• Risk assessments were carried out for the project as a whole and for individual collaborations
where appropriate;
• An open, collaborative research methodology (where questions were sometimes reworded or
reordered according to the research needs of collaborators) meant that the epistemological
integrity of the research could be called into question;
• Use of third-party data respected the original consent given at the time;
• Because of the ‘open’ approach to data collection special care must be taken with respect to
statistical claims made on the basis of the data set;
• While OER Research Hub was a project at a higher education institution, its outputs
(instruments, data, etc.) could be used in a ‘guerrilla’ context and this was considered
throughout their construction and dissemination;
• Sharing results through the project website, blog and social media accounts helped to raise
the profile of the work but meant that less polished work was presented to the world;
• Open release of research data, open access publication and digital scholarship were
nonetheless key elements of an open dissemination strategy;
• The (redacted) research dataset was made openly available and with commentary (Farrow
et al., 2015);
• The experiences of the research team informed the production of a free open course with
Peer 2 Peer University (Pitt et al., 2014) on the relevance of openness for research.
Table 4 shows the (retrospectively) completed framework, summarizing some of the ethical concerns
and considerations from the project. Each element of the grid identifies ethical aspects of the project
that were affected by openness.
Table 4: Completed framework for OER Research Hub project

Duties & Responsibilities Outcomes Personal Development

Respect for Unforced and Some gaps in data due to Encouraged reflection on
participant un-incentivized participation; unanswered questions how to encourage
autonomy no compulsory questions; participation through
translation of survey into effective research design
local languages for field
work

Avoid harm / Follow all relevant All names, contact details The research team
minimize risk institutional review board and identifiable information developed a stronger sense
requirements, especially removed from open data of how open sharing could
important in unfamiliar introduce new and
national contexts with Collaboration model meant unforeseen possibilities for
different cultural dozens of separate IRB harm and acted accordingly
expectations applications; often
extremely impractical Open research involving
institutions should allow
extra time for review board

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 A Framework for the Ethics of Open Education 105

Duties & Responsibilities Outcomes Personal Development

Full disclosure Explained nature of open Completed institutional Raising openness with
licensed dissemination to ethical reviews for all participants helped clarify
participants and give collaboration partners and expectations for future work
participants (e.g. individual institutions
interviewees) option to add Developing an ‘ethic of
criteria to their recordings Some concerns over open’ as expected practice
being released in open whether participants would
be as forthcoming if they
thought their responses
might not be anonymous

Privacy & Data Data was collected and Some countries, states and Practical experience of
Security stored securely according provinces exhibit conducting research in
to relevant institutional differences in legal different contexts makes it
policies expectations around cloud easier to prepare
storage of data. It was subsequent interventions
Research instruments were important to comply with
designed to only collect the local expectations Participants may become
personal information more used to sharing data
relevant to hypotheses (e.g. Open dissemination openly
gender, disability were strategy required redacting
included but sexual survey data sets of
orientation was not). information, which arguably
diminishes their value for
re-use
Integrity As instruments and data OER Hub is producing a Researchers were required
were released openly it was ‘researcher pack’ which will to engage closely with
important to ensure that the encourage intended re-use validity of the research
work could be followed and of instruments. An annual
reproduced survey will provide a set of Improved sense of
comparative data points for awareness of the
those re-using questions, challenges of using open
etc. and mixed methodologies

High quality research into

OER impact is needed by
developing OER movement
for planning and advocacy

Independence Research team had a duty Collaborative research Use of the framework
both to be independent and model involved some encourages authentic
to act responsively to compromises over research reflection and ownership
actually existing research methodology but in return rather than ‘box-ticking’ risk
needs of diverse large data sets were assessment
organisations acquired
Importance of projecting a
Occasionally a fine line clear and independent
between research research identity; this was
objectivity and advocacy partly achieved through
social media

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106 Robert Farrow

Duties & Responsibilities Outcomes Personal Development

Informed A duty to ensure that all Information collected from Encouraged deeper
Consent participants understood the more than 7,000 reflection on meaning of
intention to openly participants has been ‘informed consent’ in an
disseminate results and disseminated without open world where data can
redacted data; custom incident be repurposed indefinitely
consent form and in unforeseen ways

Conclusion
It should be noted that the proposed framework cannot replace existing processes of institutional
approval for research work, and should be thought of as complementary. ‘Guerrilla’ researchers
working outside institutions with open data must effectively act as their own review board by behaving
in a manner that is consistent with institutional excellence. The framework facilitates this by (i)
encouraging reflection on areas of potential moral significance; (ii) encouraging the same ethical
standards as one would expect to find adhered to in institutional settings, while (iii) noting that even
institutional guidance may not reflect what is now possible with open technologies. The framework
does not endorse any particular moral philosophy or vision of open education, focusing on the
explanatory rather than the normative force of any particular viewpoint (though of course using of
the tool could lead to substantive normative conclusions).
It is not presently possible to prescribe all contexts where openness might make an ethical
difference and, in any case, it is important for practitioners to continue to reflect on issues themselves
and practice their own autonomy and phronêsis as researchers and educators. This contribution
has shown that the principles underlying traditional research ethics can be applied in open contexts
but special consideration must be given to the consequences of open dissemination practices.
A tool for those working as open researchers or those researching open education has been
proposed and evaluated through the example of OER Research Hub. The framework is designed
to facilitate identification of ethically significant features of a particular context and aid reflection on
how different ethical consideration might be in tension with one another. Further guidance on ethics
in open education can be found in the OER Research Hub Ethics Manual (Farrow, 2013) and in
the P2Pu course ‘Open Research’ which was written by members of the OER Research Hub team
(Pitt et al., 2014). Free online training in research ethics is also available from the National Institutes
of Health (2014).

Acknowledgement
This paper was presented at the 2016 Open Education Consortium Global Conference, held in
Kraków (Poland) in April 12th–14th 2016 (http://conference.oeconsortium.org/2016/), with whom
Open Praxis established a partnership. After a pre-selection by the Conference Programme
Committee, the paper underwent the usual peer-review process in Open Praxis.
The author worked as a researcher on OER Research Hub, which was funded by The William
and Flora Hewlett Foundation. This paper reflects the views of the author only.

Notes
1
Though ubiquitous, the principles advocated in Belmont have been criticized by some (e.g. Shore, 2006)
for treating participants alike and failing to recognize important differences between subjects such as
gender, ethnicity, culture, or geography.

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 A Framework for the Ethics of Open Education 107

2
Although the principles subscribed to in each country are the same, some studies have found they are
not always applied consistently. For instance, Hearnshaw (2004) finds that many countries eschew the
review board for un-contentious experiments while the UK “has an arduous process for gaining ethical
approval for a non-invasive intervention study” (Ibid.)

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