It appears in a recent study that was published in the journal News Media Society that the researchers found that bloggers would write about their personal thoughts, but they valued being honest with their audience members and telling the truth, having accountability, and reducing harm and attribution. According to the Science Daily article, here were the characteristics that the researchers defined among these three key constructs:
“Truth telling involves honesty, fairness and completeness in reporting. Accountability involves being answerable to the public, bearing the consequences of one’s actions and revealing conflicts of interest, and minimizing harm underlies issues involving privacy, confidentiality, reputational harm, consideration of others’ feelings, and respecting diversity and underprivileged groups. Attribution covers issues such as avoiding plagiarism, honouring intellectual property rights and giving sources proper credit.”
However, one of the interesting points that this study made is that this blogger ethical code of conduct depends on the audience that they are writing to. The article states that in this study, researchers found that when bloggers’s audinences are ” more likely to consist of people you know, minimizing harm may be a higher priority than telling the truth.”
Wow – so, what does this mean exactly? As a blogger, I do believe that we need to have a code of ethics that we live by both online AND offline. People seem to think that things are different online than they are in real life – but they are not. We need to have a balanced approach to how we present ourselves in all aspects – by having this, you will have a more stable and positive reputation among not only your blog audience, but those that known you in real life as well. It is all about managing your personal reputation effectively.
So in other words – have the same ethical standard that you practice in real life and apply it to your online activities. It will be interesting to see how this all plays out. Interesting study and I am sure more will follow in this research line – such as looking at code of conduct and ethical situations on social networking sites such as Facebook and what people write about on Twitter – or even what pictures / videos they post on YouTube and TwitPic about people. So, there are numerous possibilities here. 🙂
Hope you all are having a great day! 🙂
Best Wishes,
Karen
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