Research Ethics in Second Language Education: Universal Principles, Local Practices

This book makes a fresh contribution to the field of research ethics by considering research issues through relatable autobiographical narratives. The book’s core offers narratives by novice second language education researchers who are completing PhD degrees using data from international research participants. These narratives expose challenges regarding the ethical identity of researchers working across diverse value and belief systems. The narrative chapters are followed by four chapters of commentaries from a line-up of international scholars with various academic, linguistic, and cultural backgrounds.

The case study approach reports the experiences and reflections of research students before, during, and after the data collection phase of their projects, and offers insights into the recruitment of participants; acquiring and maintaining access; interpretations of the notion of informed consent; incentivising participants; the implications of ensuring anonymity and confidentiality; the right to withdraw participation and data; the positioning of the researcher as insider or outsider; potential conflicts of interest; the potential harm to participants and researcher; and the dissemination of findings.

This practical and relatable book is aimed at research students and their supervisors in fields such as applied linguistics and education, as well as those following methods courses, to help illustrate the ethical challenges faced by researchers in the process of collecting qualitative data.

Roger Barnard has recently retired as an Associate Professor in applied linguistics at the University of Waikato. Before taking up his present post in New Zealand in 1995, he worked in England, Europe, and the Middle East as teacher, teacher educator, manager, and adviser to ministries of education. He has recently accepted visiting professorships in several Asian universities, where he has taught postgraduate courses and undertaken joint research projects, most of which have led to collaborative publications. His most recent books are Codeswitching in University English-Medium Classes: Asian Perspectives (2014, co-edited with McLellan), Language Learner Autonomy: Teachers’ Beliefs and Practices in Asian Contexts (2016, co-edited with Li), Reflective Practice: Voices from the Field (2017, co-edited with Ryan), and English Medium Instruction Programmes: Perspectives from South East Asian Universities (2018, co-edited with Hasim).

Yi Wang is a language teacher and researcher at Waikato Institute of Technology, New Zealand, and Associate Professor at Shandong University of Technology, China. She holds a BA and MA in English education and obtained her PhD in applied linguistics from the University of Waikato in 2016. Her doctoral study investigated language teacher cognition and practice regarding learner autonomy, with particular focus on the shift of control from teachers to learners. Her wide research interests include autonomous learner and teacher development, narrative inquiry, and migrant ESOL beginners’ literacy development. She has published book chapters with Routledge and articles with the Journal of International Students, Teaching Education, and Chinese Journal of Applied Linguistics. She is currently collaborating on projects involving the impact of Covid-19 on language teacher beliefs and practices; religious values and EFL teacher identity construction; and the identity trajectories of PhD students in cross-linguistic and -cultural contexts.