IRB+Proposal_EF


 * MEMO: IRB PROPOSAL AND CONSENT FORM**


 * PROJECT DESCRIPTION:**

Regimes of ‘Making’: Possibilities for Critical Making Practices From the Local to the Global Scale
 * __Title:__**
 * __Summary__**

This study is a sociological and discursive analysis of current ‘Maker’ cultures and skill-sharing communities, particularly of their emerging role in global economic and science outreach issues. The ‘Maker’ movement involves many individuals and practices, but is currently defined as like-minded people with a Do-It-Yourself ethic to fabricate, remake and remix products for their own personal use, or for use by a greater community. It is also based in the ‘open-source’ ethics of creating projects that are non-proprietary, for everyone to share, remix and reuse. In the ‘maker’ movement there is a great implication for possible effects in public engagement of the sciences as indicated by the insurgence of makerspaces -- where like-minded ‘makers’ gather to share skills and projects -- in high schools, libraries and museums. This study explores the possibilities for such communities through a more critical practice that is interested in creating relevant and helpful technologies apart from ‘wow’ factor gadgetry and projects. It also seeks to explicate the multitudinous spectrum of such skill-sharing communities and demonstrate that there is a tension which has global economic implications for ‘innovation,’ ‘entrepreneurship’ and extraction of local labor.

The empirical material for this study will be gathered at various sites of skill-sharing communities, civic science actions, and scientific public engagement. Key research sites will include the Troy Makerspace, the Hacktory in Philadelphia, AS220Labs in Providence, and Resistor in Brooklyn, NY. Methodologically, it will employ participant observations, surveys and work-shop feedback within these various field sites – both off and online. Extensive interviews will also be conducted with select individuals who have helped to start spaces, kept said spaces running within various communities or run workshops that engage the larger community. Surveys may be completed in a workshop setting or through online form. Participant observation and workshops will be conducted in person by Ellen Foster at the various sites. All interviews will be conducted in person, either at the interviewee’s home or the skill-sharing site in which they are involved. Interviews will be partly or completely transcribed either by Ellen Foster or by a commercial transcription service. The transcripts will be returned to the interviewee for editing and approval before they are analyzed and direct quotations excerpted.

The study will contribute to emergent historical data on public engagement of science, civic science and critical making practices. Findings will be published in book form and in various articles. They will also be catalogued and archived on-line, particularly to document various work-shop materials and practices for future use and research.


 * __RESPONSE QUESTIONS TO IRB__**

Title of Proposal: Regimes of ‘Making’: Possibilities for Critical Making Practices From the Local to the Global Scale

Researcher: Ellen Foster

Campus Address: Sage 5711

Email: fostee21@rpi.edu

Phone: 616-822-7085

Research Adviser (for students): Ron Eglash

Objective: This is a sociological, historically discursive and ethnographic study that will document and analyze emerging skill-sharing communities, creating a database and archive of their current practices while also assessing future possibilities and directions for these communities.

Methods: Interviews (about 2 hours in length) with individuals deeply involved in ‘maker’ communities and culture as well as other skill-sharing communities will be conducted. Interview subjects will be recruited through email messages and when appropriate mailed letters which will describe aims, methods and relevance of the project to them – included will be a copy of the study’s informed consent form. Initial contacts will be drawn from in-person contact with individuals at various research field-sites, but the contact list will evolve as the study progresses. Interviews will grow out of interactions and relationships that form from participant observations which will be conducted at the various sites previously indicated. Those involved in the sites will be made aware that they are being observed for research and may answer a survey which will be anonymous and devoid of personal identification markers. Alongside participant observation, Ellen Foster will conduct several workshops co-designed by subjects that introduce critical making and participatory design practices within skill-sharing communities – participants will be consented to this research before taking part in the workshop.

Effects on the subjects: There will be minimal physical effects on the subjects as they will be observed, interviewed and participate in various workshops.

Measures to minimize risk: All interviews and involvement will be voluntary. Those observed and worked with will be given the opportunity to be anonymous, to stop their involvement in the research at any point, or to retract their data or interview material before publication.

The recordings of interviews and survey data will be stored on the computer of Ellen Foster as password protected encrypted files. All handwritten notes taken during interview and during participant observation will be transcribed in digital format, then destroyed. If an interviewee disagrees to have his or her interview material shared with others, then I will be the only one to have access to the restricted material. All copies of the interviews in my possession will be destroyed at any time on the request of the interviewee. The material will be kept for no longer than 15 years after which material will be erased from all digital sources.

Likelihood of harm: Minimal

Documentation of risks: None.

Benefits to participants: Participants in this study will directly and indirectly benefit from development of a record and analysis of the ‘maker’ community in which they are involved. Results of the study will be presented to other researchers and decision-makers who are possibly responsible for funding ‘maker’ communities. This research is also meant to garner more visibility to certain ‘maker’ communities so that they can gain more memberships and better serve the communities in which they are situated, while gaining a better understanding of their technical practices and motivations.

Alternative Method not Using Human Subjects: None possible.

Qualifications of Researchers: Ellen Foster is a Doctoral student in Science and Technology Studies and is gaining extensive experience and understanding of participant observer and interview practices while at RPI. Ellen Foster conducts interviews in accordance with the code of research ethics established by the American Anthropological Association.

Recruiting of subjects: Interview subjects will be contacted directly, informed of the purpose of the interview, and given the opportunity to refuse the interview. Skill-sharing communities will be informed of my intentions to observe their activities and given the opportunity to create collaborative work-shops, but only of their own volition and interest.

Confidentiality: The participants will be given the opportunity to define the extent to which their names will be associated with any (or all) statement(s) during the interview as well as observation, and will be given the right to retract any statement at any time prior to publication of research results. Any statements that participants designate as “off the record” will not be attributed to the participant, nor used in a way that would link their statement to said participant. As is codified in the Informed Consent Form, I will use any such comments only as background information, and will not quote them in either an attributed or unattributed way in future work.

Specimen of Consent Form: Please see “Informed Consent Form” attached.

Preliminary Interview Guide is also attached (Please See Hierarchy of Questions & Interview Questions 2 – still need to incorporate this part)


 * INFORMED CONSENT FORM **


 * ANTHROPOLOGICAL STUDY OF EXPOSURE ASSESSMENT RESEARCH COMMUNITY **


 * Ellen Foster, Department of Science and Technology Studies **
 * Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute / Troy, NY 12180 (616-822-7085) / fostee21@rpi.edu **

Contact information for Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Review Board: Chair, Institutional Review Board, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, CII 7015, 110 8th Street, Troy, NY 12180

This interview with __________________________________ is being conducted as part of an anthropological study of skill-sharing and ‘maker’ communities. The research will result in public talks, articles, an online database and a book. The interview will be recorded on tape, with the following conditions:

1. Your participation in this interview is voluntary. You may terminate the interview at any time during our conversation. The interview will last approximately two hours.

2. You may ask that the tape be turned off at any time during this interview, and I will turn the tape off.

3. You may designate any comments you make on the tape as “off the record.” You may also designate comments as “off the record” retrospectively, either at a later point in the interview or in the process of approving the transcript. I promise to use such comments only as background information, and will not quote them in either an attributed or unattributed fashion in any of my future work.

4. I will transcribe the tape in part or in full. I will submit any such full or partial transcript to you for your approval. You will be free to edit, clarify, amend, or delete any part of the transcript before returning it to me, having made a copy of the transcript and any changes you make to it for your own files.

5. I will be free to quote from this approved transcript, and only this approved transcript, in my future work. The tape itself will not be made public in any fashion, and can also be destroyed if you so request. The transcript of the interview will not be made public unless you explicitly approve a request to do so.

6. The tape of the interview will be stored on the computer of Ellen Foster as password protected (128-bit) encrypted files, and will not be shared with anyone except for the person hired to transcribe the interview. The transcriber has been instructed to consider all transcripts strictly confidential, and to destroy all copies of the interview once the transcription has been transmitted to Ellen Foster. Once as a digital text file, the transcript will be stored on the computer of Ellen Foster, again with password protection and encryption. All hard copies of the transcript will be stored in the offices of either Ellen Foster, which are locked when she is not present. Only Ellen Foster will have access to both electronic and hard copies of transcribed interviews. All copies of the interview (recorded and transcribed) will be destroyed at any time on the request of the interviewee.

7. You have the right to remain anonymous, and can do so by initializing here:. If you do not choose to remain anonymous, in quoting from the approved transcript in my future work, I may attribute remarks directly to you, but will not necessarily do so.

8. If you have any additional conditions that you would like to add, write them here and they will be considered part of this agreement:

Additional Conditions: Finally, if for any reason you change your mind about this interview or any of these conditions in the future, I promise to respect any request that you make to me. I will not be able to retract anything that is already in print or in press based on the approved transcript, but I will honor any future request to change any of the terms of this agreement, up to and including complete retraction of the interview and permission to quote from it.

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