Ethics – balancing power relations through consent

One way I aimed to address power imbalances when working with potentially vulnerable individuals, was via the ethical approval procedure by UEA. This allowed me to reflect and receive feedback on whether for instance, potential consequences of the research for research participants were addressed appropriately even before conducting the research, and how to make clear to participants that they could opt

out of the research process at any point.

Interviewing in the context of a disaster meant that I had to take particular care to not re-traumatise research participants. In this instance, I drew upon my previous experience of working and interviewing in a humanitarian context through my work as a programme manager during the Sichuan Earthquake response in 2008. In addition, during my first research trip, I took part in a full day workshop run by the Israeli Relief Service on how to interview disaster survivors. The workshop suggested for example that when talking about the disaster - Typhoon Haiyan - one should ask interviewees to describe not only the disaster itself, but also the time before and after the disaster, to support the interviewee in moving on from the initial disaster impact and focussing on how they coped with it.

Moreover, I took care to not pressure interviewees into taking part in the research if they did not want to. This is one of the reasons why it seemed more appropriate to have less formal interviews with the community, as it allowed individuals to opt-in or out when I approached them, rather than being put under pressure to attend a formal interview. Moreover, conducting most of the community interviews during the second field trip, meant that there had been over half a year since the disaster happened, which suggests that although some individuals might still suffer from post-traumatic-stress-disorder, there is a lesser chance of the majority of interviewees still being traumatised. Overall, there was only one interviewee who was visibly distressed at one point of our interview. I offered him to finish or take a break from the interview, but he wanted to continue. It appeared that his emotional distress was relief rather than pain, and he was happy to talk to me further. As one can never be completely sure of the mental wellbeing of an interviewee when approaching them, it is of utmost importance to make sure that the interviewee is given the opportunity to opt out of the research, and that the researcher tries to assess the comfort level of the participant and either continues or aborts the interview accordingly.

I used a UEA ethics committee approved consent form that included a brief overview of my research; my contact details, and explained how the data would be used and whether the interviewee wanted to remain anonymous (see appendix A1 and A2). My goal was to ensure that research participants would clearly understand what I

intended to do with the collected data and could get in touch with me in case there was any concern or question. By explaining the idea of consent, I aimed to clarify especially for timid research participants that their participation was optional and on even ground as they had the power to withdraw, be anonymous, or get in touch to discuss the research. This was especially relevant for my local key informants, as these interviews built the basis for answering how Radyo Bakdaw was accessible and inclusive and whether this community-focused approach was novel in Guiuan. This meant that it was especially important to build a relationship that was on even ground, in which participants knew they could decide which of their thoughts they wanted me to use and which they would rather not see published. Additionally, I found that it was important to explain the research verbally rather than having a long, written consent form, that at times, seemed to be too formal and intimidating.

Through meeting most key research participants more than once or at least letting them know where in Guiuan they could find me, I gave participants an opportunity to contact me in case they had further questions or changed their minds about participating.

This was in accordance with the recommendation of the ethics committee who suggested to consider relying on verbal rather than extensive written consent to make participants more comfortable. Accordingly, I decided on a case-by-case basis whether to obtain written or verbal consent. I made sure that I always explained what the research would be used for, who I was, where I was studying, how research participants could contact me, that participants could opt-out of answering questions, and that all data would be used anonymously. It is important to include these ethical considerations into the methodology, as they are partly a way to address power relations and thus also relate to the participatory elements of my research method.

All collected data will be used anonymously, even though most research participants said they would be happy for me to use their names. But due to the geographical limitations of the research area and the sparse media landscape, I decided it may be more prudent for individuals’ professional future to keep all data anonymised. Some company names will be used, such as the Eastern Samar Electric Cooperative (ESAMELCO) for instance, as data connected to the company was publically

broadcast and available and ESAMELCO is the only Electricity Company in Guiuan.

The research questions did not have a specific focus on gender. Nevertheless, the research aimed to address gender by seeking to use what Few and colleagues describe as a ‘gender-sensitive approach’ in their guide to post-disaster evaluations (Few, Mcavoy, Tarazona, & Walden, 2014, p. 12). With this, they refer to the inclusion of gender dimensions into all levels of collecting and analysing data, as opposed to taking a gender-focused approach that would require different methods and would have a gender-focused research frame. As my research questions are not directly focussing on gender, I chose a gender-sensitive rather than gender-focused approach, striving to collect ‘sex and age disaggregated data’ (Few, Mcavoy, Tarazona, &

Walden, 2014, p. 12). The core broadcasting team was equally split along gender lines.

The qualitative community data set had a bias towards women (16 women and 12 men). Within the quantitative data sets, there was a larger part of women who participated (community survey 1: 193 women and 122 men, 16 non-identified;

community survey 2: 186 women, 71 men, 1 other). I will elaborate further on the question of gender in the collected data, in the quantitative data section (4.6).

The following sections will give contextual background regarding the two field trips and explore collected data sets, establishing how quantitative and qualitative data was collected, why certain data samples were selected, what challenges were encountered, and how the data shaped the research framework and answered my research questions.