I don't get the controversy over this. How is this different than a news website displaying more tragic stories or more upbeat stories on their homepage, and seeing how it affects users? Someone in another thread mentioned supermarkets playing sad music and happy music. Or even Facebook's normal newsfeed algorithm tweaking, where they've very likely done tests similar to this.
XKCD: Research Ethics
21–30 of 30 posts
Re: XKCD: Research Ethics
#22Earlier quoted context omitted.
Because those aren't psychological experiments. Nobody's claiming it's ethical for an ad company to make you feel bad about yourself, but that's not really the point here. The point is that there are strict ethics rules for running experiments, and one of those rules is, except for a limited exception (that does not apply), the subjects need to be knowingly taking part in the experiment.
You're not explaining the inconsistency, you're just giving it a name. If someone says "why are the sentences for crack cocaine 5 times longer than for regular cocaine?", it's silly to answer "because these are the rules we have, and they were passed by official people".
That's really quite a terrible and completely irrelevant analogy. It's not that the rules are different, it's that we have rules, period, for experiments. There are no ethical rules for advertising. There are rules about lying, but that's basically it. But experiments? Yeah, we have ethical rules for those, and Facebook seems to have deliberately ignored them.
Re: XKCD: Research Ethics
#23Companies have been purposely making people feel bad about themselves for a very long time. Ads intentionally make people feel ugly, lazy, stupid, fat, dirty, smelly, dandruffy, lonely and ashamed so they'll buy whatever product is on offer. Commerce is all about manipulating people for profit. I'm not a Facebook fan, but tell me how this is worse than standard operating procedure with every other consumer product?
> I'm not a Facebook fan, but tell me how this is worse than standard operating procedure with every other consumer product? When I see an ad, I know that the company wants me to give them my money. When I see my friend post something on Facebook, they want to communicate or connect in some way ... note that it is not a monetary desire to buy something from a friend, but to connect with them on a human and emotional…
> When I see an ad, I know that the company wants me to give them my money.
Similarly, you should know that everything you see on Facebook is designed to profit from your attention. The choices they make about what ads to show and what to put in your newsfeed are not altruistic. These decisions are about what's best for Facebook, not what's best for you.
If it profits Procter & Gamble or Unilever[0] to show ads that make you feel inferior or anxious, that's what they'll do.
And if Facebook can make you feel lonely or sad so you'll spend more time on Facebook and see more ads, that's what they'll do too.
> to imply that it's just like an ad is utter horseshit
I'm not seeing a big distinction.
[0] http://www.vocativ.com/world/india/indias-5-worst-ads-skin-w...
Re: XKCD: Research Ethics
#24Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're not explaining the inconsistency, you're just giving it a name. If someone says "why are the sentences for crack cocaine 5 times longer than for regular cocaine?", it's silly to answer "because these are the rules we have, and they were passed by official people".
I would postulate it's because people feel uncomfortable in situations where they are made to feel like lab rats, and that as a society we decided that these rules should be in place so that people who do not have the same views do not abuse those of us who do.
Such experiments are run all the time on large populations. So that's nothing new. It's interesting to see what views there will be about this time after decades. X-ray show fitting matchines? Radiation pills to cure everything? Will aspartamine be allowed in food products after 50 years? Will it be allowed only because it was allowed earlier, even if it's known (then) to be dangerous? What about mobile phones and radiation? Is it ok to have 2w microwave trasmitter attached to your head all day long? Etc. Why is alcohol and nicotine still allowed to be sold, even if known to be toxic and damaging to health. What about acetylsalicylic acid as analgesic, and list goes on. Margarines were really popular at one time, and adverticed as healtyh option to butter.
Re: XKCD: Research Ethics
#25Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're not explaining the inconsistency, you're just giving it a name. If someone says "why are the sentences for crack cocaine 5 times longer than for regular cocaine?", it's silly to answer "because these are the rules we have, and they were passed by official people".
That's really quite a terrible and completely irrelevant analogy. It's not that the rules are different, it's that we have rules, period, for experiments. There are no ethical rules for advertising. There are rules about lying, but that's basically it. But experiments? Yeah, we have ethical rules for those, and Facebook seems to have deliberately ignored them.
What about ad companies running different ads in different markets and analyzing the resulting sales data? Isn't that an experiment?
Re: XKCD: Research Ethics
#26I don't get the controversy over this. How is this different than a news website displaying more tragic stories or more upbeat stories on their homepage, and seeing how it affects users? Someone in another thread mentioned supermarkets playing sad music and happy music. Or even Facebook's normal newsfeed algorithm tweaking, where they've very likely done tests similar to this.
Because in your example, it is an interaction between you and the news site. You expect the news corporation to do this.
Facebook is not about communication between you and Facebook, but between you and other users. Facebook is effectively manipulating communication and the relationship you have with your friends on the website.
The manipulation of the feed is subject to the intent of the manipulation. If the goal is to make sure that you see things you want to do anyways (posts by friends you interact with often, for example), then that seems reasonable. Here the manipulation is not to make the user's experience better.
Re: XKCD: Research Ethics
#27Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I'm not a Facebook fan, but tell me how this is worse than standard operating procedure with every other consumer product? When I see an ad, I know that the company wants me to give them my money. When I see my friend post something on Facebook, they want to communicate or connect in some way ... note that it is not a monetary desire to buy something from a friend, but to connect with them on a human and emotional…
> When I see an ad, I know that the company wants me to give them my money. Similarly, you should know that everything you see on Facebook is designed to profit from your attention. The choices they make about what ads to show and what to put in your newsfeed are not altruistic. These decisions are about what's best for Facebook, not what's best for you. If it profits Procter & Gamble or Unilever[0] to show ads that…
So then why not do a test to see if injecting grammatical and spelling errors into a friend's post changes one's smug sense of superiority over them? I mean, sure it might be manipulative but hey, that's what ads are, right?
Re: XKCD: Research Ethics
#28Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's really quite a terrible and completely irrelevant analogy. It's not that the rules are different, it's that we have rules, period, for experiments. There are no ethical rules for advertising. There are rules about lying, but that's basically it. But experiments? Yeah, we have ethical rules for those, and Facebook seems to have deliberately ignored them.
What about ad companies running different ads in different markets and analyzing the resulting sales data? Isn't that an experiment?
Not in the sense the OP means. They mean in the sense of a scientific experiment being done nominally to advance our understanding of the world (or in the case of psychology, specifically the mind and our perception of the world), vetted by a review board, and published in a peer-reviewed journal as part of the academic process.
This is very different from the colloquial use of 'experiment' to talk about an A/B test or similar. It's a very specific context where we have very specific rules in order to prevent people from committing horrendous acts in the name of obtaining greater understanding.
Re: XKCD: Research Ethics
#29Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're not explaining the inconsistency, you're just giving it a name. If someone says "why are the sentences for crack cocaine 5 times longer than for regular cocaine?", it's silly to answer "because these are the rules we have, and they were passed by official people".
That's really quite a terrible and completely irrelevant analogy. It's not that the rules are different, it's that we have rules, period, for experiments. There are no ethical rules for advertising. There are rules about lying, but that's basically it. But experiments? Yeah, we have ethical rules for those, and Facebook seems to have deliberately ignored them.
You're simply repeating the same error that the GP criticized. Yes, we call the first situation A, and the second, B; and B has [more] rules, while A does not. (A = advertising, B = a Real Experiment)
Great, but why? What it is about B that justifies the different ethical/legal criteria? Surely it's not the fact that eridius applied the label "experiment" to one and not the other?
How can it make sense to say that doing X is ethical "as long as you're just trying to make money, not publish scientific results"? Presumably, certain things are just wrong to do for whatever reason, and that is why scientific bodies user their publishing standards to prevent them from happening. Those reasons are surely just as applicable in other contexts; if scientific bodies don't have rules for those cases, its because they have no influence there, not because they think it's hunky-dory outside the lab!
"Well, yeah, MegaCorp burned people alive, but it's okay because they were just trying to make money, not publish results on human flammability."
How many more different ways can commenters make the above point, so that people will stop replying that "what advertisers do is not a Real Experiment, so they deserve a lesser standard"? That's a restatement of the inconsistency, not a resolution of it.
Re: XKCD: Research Ethics
#30I don't get the controversy over this. How is this different than a news website displaying more tragic stories or more upbeat stories on their homepage, and seeing how it affects users? Someone in another thread mentioned supermarkets playing sad music and happy music. Or even Facebook's normal newsfeed algorithm tweaking, where they've very likely done tests similar to this.
Because in your example, it is an interaction between you and the news site. You expect the news corporation to do this. Facebook is not about communication between you and Facebook, but between you and other users. Facebook is effectively manipulating communication and the relationship you have with your friends on the website. The manipulation of the feed is subject to the intent of the manipulation. If the goal is…
Their goal is to make you stay on the website the longest, or click on the most ads, or whatever. It's not like facebook is normally benevolent and tuning their filter to help you. In any case, the filter is presumably for posts from distant friends and pages you've subscribed to, not manipulating your close friends.