Ethical Considerations

The research adhered to the guidelines laid down by the British Psychological Society (BPS) (British Psychological Society, 2006); the British Sociological Association (British Sociological Association, 2002); the British Educational Research Association (British Educational Research Association, 2004); and, Cardiff University School of Social Sciences (SOCSI). Ethical approval was obtained from the SOCSI ethical committee in June 2007 and Criminal Record Bureau checks were carried out with respect to the researcher. The main ethical issue was how to obtain informed consent from the children who were to be observed in the dining hall.

The BPS guidelines (2006) state that, without informed consent, observational research should be restricted to public behaviour in situations where individuals would reasonably expect to be observed by strangers. However, in law, a school is not considered to be a public place other than on occasions it is opened to the public for a special purpose (e.g., a school fete). The implication of this was that informed consent would be required from all participants which was anticipated to be problematic with respect to the child participants involved in the dining hall observation. The feasibility of carrying out the research without the children was rejected since the inter-personal relationships between the school meal staff and the children were critical from a SE perspective. Consequently, a non-participant observation with the researcher overtly visible was planned and a range of consent protocols were considered with respect to involving the children. The consent protocol adopted involved seeking consent from gatekeepers in loco parentis supplemented by parental ‘opt out’ consent obtained via pupil-post16.

16 Letters sent home to parents via the pupils

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Opt-out (or passive) consent involves informing both parent and child about the study and then asking parents to sign and return a consent form if they do not wish the child to participate (Severson & Biglan, 1989). Where the specific nature of the research precludes obtaining consent directly from the participants, approval from their duly authorised representatives is acceptable (British Psychological Society, 2006). In schools, approval from gatekeepers acting in loco parentis is suggested (Foster, 1996).

Precedents have been set for ethical approval boards to waive the requirement to obtain signed informed consent from the parent/guardian of each schoolchild in favour of a ‘passive’ consent procedure (R. Brown & Ogden, 2004; Peterson Jr, Mann, Kealey, & Marek, 2000; Starkey et al., 2005). The argument in favour of passive consent is that it mitigates problems associated with reduced participant numbers and the resultant sampling bias (Severson & Biglan, 1989). For example, Brown and Ogden (2004) found that their potential sample size was reduced by 50% after seeking active parental consent from parents o f 9-13 year old for a study into the effects of modelling and parental control on eating behaviours. Conversely, Carroll-Lind, Chapman, Gregory & Maxwell (2006) found that a passive consent protocol increased representativeness by achieving 93% participation. The major risk envisaged with this approach was considered to be the reliability of pupil-post as a com m unication

mechanism. However, this was considered to be mitigated by having supplementary consent granted in loco parentis. In this case, the gatekeepers were the Director of Education, Head Teacher, Governing Body, Parent/Teacher Associations and any other parties requested by the Head Teacher. A number of additional issues, based on those identified by Severson and Biglan (1989), were considered in the course of defining the detail of consent protocol.

To ensure confidentiality, names of individuals, schools or the LEA would be excluded from any fieldnotes, analysis or published reports. The data were expected to be both non-personal and non-sensitive and the use of pupil-post eliminated the need to hold names and addresses of the child participants. The overall risk of harm or distress to the children was considered to be low and greatly outweighed by the potential benefits of the study with respect to improving the health of children. No assessment or testing of participants was being undertaken, and children would only be observed engaging in normal eating behaviours during the school meal break. This

behaviour was not considered high risk, controversial or that which, in other circumstances, would not be freely carried out in a public place, e.g., a restaurant.

The provision of post-hoc information to participants is typically considered to be the disclosure of any unanticipated side effects revealed by the research. In the event this applied to any of the observed behaviours, it would be made known to the appropriate authority, e.g. the headteacher.

As the study aimed to observe behaviours in a primary school dining room, other ethical and practical issues were envisaged with respect to the handling of children whose participation was withheld. The school could be excluded from the study should any parent withhold consent. However, this would have exacerbated recruitment and sampling issues and render the sample too small for a viable study.

Alternately, a means could be found whereby non-participating children could consume their school lunch away from the main body of children and lunch time supervisors. However, Health and Safety implications were envisaged with alternate eating venues or supervision arrangements. In addition, this could potentially stigmatise the child and be an inconvenience for the school, the school meal provider and parents (should the alternative be for the child to eat at home). Therefore, the protocol adopted was to exclude the school from the study should a large proportion of parents withhold consent. Otherwise, school staff were asked to identify non­

participating children so that the observation did not attend to them. Identifying the children by the wearing of badges was rejected due to the risk to data validity of drawing the children’s attention to the fact that something unusual is occurring.

The non-sensitive personal data that was gathered during recruitment as part of the process of gaining informed consent to participate in the study was handled in accordance with the requirements of the Data Protection Act 1998 and the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

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