Ethical Issues in (Online) Social Network Research in Education

In this article we discuss a relatively under-researched area in terms of research ethics, namely, social network research in education, including educational research focusing on social networking websites. Our discussion focuses on several key issues in social network research such as privacy in conjunction with anonymity, voluntary participation with foci on consent forms and second parties. In addition, we shed light on newly emerging issues from social media based research. In so doing, we call for more cautious approaches to social network data collection and analysis in education research.