Research with young children: Some ethical dilemmas

This paper explores elements of an ethnographic case study of the peer group ‘realities’ of young children and seeks to illuminate a number of ethical difficulties concerning responsibility and trust in relation to my position as researcher of young children within a school setting. In this position, I have experienced a tension between trying to capture the ‘natural’ social setting of peer group interactions through conducting ‘affinity’ group discussions with a small group of young children and being a ‘responsible’ adult in the company of these children within the overarching disciplinary framework of the school. In this regard, I felt conflicted between my research intention and my researcher responsibilities. I intended to attempt to closely reflect the social environment and interactions of a boy’s peer group. In this sense, I hoped to intervene within this environment as little as possible. However, on a number of occasions, the peer group involved in the study interacted in ways ‘problematic’ to its members. Thus, despite my intention to be as non-interventionist as I could, there were numerous situations where my position as responsible researcher of young children compelled me to intervene