What about digital media ethics?

 



Check out my video presentation based on my final research paper on digital media ethics.

I became drawn to this topic sometime earlier in the semester. I remember the concept being mentioned and wanting to learn more, so I am happy to have had the chance to explore digital media ethics in more depth through my paper. We've discussed "fake news" and plagiarism here, but I wondered if teachers had a responsibility to guide students through how to navigate other ethical challenges that have spawned in our Digital Age, like cyberbullying and hacking. This is a bit of an aside, but I like to watch these YouTubers that "catch" online scammers by hacking their computers. They're like these "Robin Hoods" of hacking, and it was sort of interesting to consider the convergence of hacking and ethics in that way, and how "hacking" could be used for "good." 

So, what did I learn? I found out that digital media ethics is a heavily under-researched topic, and maybe that's why it may not have come up in many of our required readings. In fact, many (if not all) of the peer-reviewed papers I found through our library lamented or at least made mention of the fact that there's little research on the topic overall. Also, I expounded more on this in my presentation but I found an interesting survey out of Ireland. Researchers McGarr and McDonagh (2021) spoke with would-be teachers in teacher education programs and found that other than social media usage, rising teachers weren't very digitally literate, and that includes their ability to navigate challenges related to digital media ethics.

What do you think? Should digital media ethics be considered a digital literacy competency on par with other skills we've discussed this semester?

References

McGarr, O., & McDonagh, A. (2021). Exploring the digital competence of pre-service teachers on entry onto an initial teacher education programme in Ireland. Irish Educational Studies, 40(1), 115–128. https://doi.org/10.1080/03323315.2020.1800501


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