Open AccessEthical Issues in Health Research With Novel Online Sources
Author(s) -
Effy Vayena,
Anna C. Mastroianni,
Jeffrey Kahn
Publication year - 2012
Publication title -
american journal of public health
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.284
H-Index - 264
eISSN - 1541-0048
pISSN - 0090-0036
DOI - 10.2105/ajph.2012.300813
Subject(s) - the internet , internet privacy , research ethics , public health , health policy , work (physics) , public relations , health information , data science , engineering ethics , sociology , health care , world wide web , medicine , computer science , political science , engineering , nursing , law , mechanical engineering
Health-related research is increasingly drawing on novel sources of online data, such as crowdsourced information about disease outbreaks, consumer-supplied information provided to health or wellness Web sites, Internet search queries about personal health, and social network postings that identify health behaviors. We offer examples of online sources and their uses, identify ethical and policy issues they generate, and formulate key questions for future discussion and investigation. Further work in this area will require cross-disciplinary collaboration to develop ethics and policy guidance for the ethical use of these novel data sources in health-related research.