The Digital Ethics of Care Project

Supporting education of children and young people in digital media, digital citizenship and online moral decision making

PI Dr Michelle O’Reilly (Associate Professor of Communication in Mental Health, Chartered Psychologist in Health (C. Psychol. AFBPSS), Assistant Deputy Chair (UEIC); Co-Chair (RIWG), Assistant Deputy Director Midlands DTP in Mental health and Neuroscience, University of Leicester)

This research comprised of two projects: 

Project one – funded by the Wellcome Trust

Social media and adolescent mental health: A preliminary qualitative exploration of the potential use of social media for promoting mental health and well being among 12-18-year-olds.Wellcome Trust (2015) £4160 (project reference: 109393/Z/15/Z) (FEC – £22,558.33).

Michelle O’Reilly, Paul Reilly, Panos Vostanis, Nisha Dogra, Jason Hughes, and Natasha Whiteman.

Participants were recruited from London and Leicester (UK) through 2016, and focus groups were conducted separately with different groups, which included six groups (6-12 participants in each) with adolescents, 11–18 years (N=54), two with mental health practitioners (N=8) and two with educational professionals (N=16). We primarily utilised reflexive thematic analysis to analyse our data. 

Outputs from the project

• O’Reilly, M., Levine, D., Donoso, V., Voice, L., Hughes, J., and Dogra, N. (2023). Exploring the potentially positive interaction between social media and mental health: the perspectives of adolescents. Clinical Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 28(2), 668-682
• O’Reilly, M., Levine, D., and Law, E. (2021). Digital Ethics of Care philosophy to understand adolescents' sense of responsibility on social media. Pastoral Care in Education, 39(2), 91-107
• O’Reilly, M. (2020). Social media and adolescent mental health: The good, the bad and the ugly. Journal of Mental Health, 29(2), 200-206
• O’Reilly, M., Dogra, N., Hughes, J., Reilly, P., George, R., and Whiteman, N. (2018). Potential of social media in promoting mental health in adolescents. Health Promotion International,34 (5), 981-991
• O’Reilly, M., Adams, S., Whiteman, N., Hughes, J., Reilly, P., and Dogra, N. (2018). Whose responsibility is adolescent mental health in the UK? The perspectives of key stakeholders. School Mental Health, 10, 450-461
• O’Reilly, M., Dogra, N., Whiteman, N., Hughes, J., Eruyar, S., and Reilly, P. (2018). Is social media bad for mental health and wellbeing? Exploring the perspectives of adolescents. Clinical Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 23(4), 601-613

Project two – funded by the ESRC (eNurture network +)

Empowering pre-teens online through a digital ethics of care, ESRC (eNurture network funding) (2021) £17,659.48 (22,074.35 FEC), Ref: G107030 PA-R2

Michelle O’Reilly, Diane Levine, and Sarah Adams.

Engaging one primary school in England two year 6 groups of children had training in interview shills and of those who received training, 18 children (with parental consent), volunteered to participate. These 18 children formed nine interviewer/interviewee dyads (N=18). The children interviewed each other as in a traditional qualitative interview study and had adult support in the form of a teaching assistant in the classroom and a researcher online. Each dyad worked together for up to 60-minutes.

Outputs from the project

• O’Reilly, M., Adams, S., Batchelor, R., and Levine, D. (in press). Exploring the practice of 10-11-year-olds as co-researchers: Using a hybrid approach in educational research to promote children as interviewers. International Journal of Social Research Methodology,
• O’Reilly, M., Levine, D., Batchelor, R., and Adams, S. (In press). Digital ethics of care and digital citizenship in UK primary schools: Children as interviewers. Journal of Children and Media 

We are still publishing from this project. A toolkit was also created with lesson plans for teachers. More information can be found on our figshare pages.