Ethical Issues in Leadership Studies

Research Ethics

The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of transformational leadership using observational humor for organizations to develop a culture of diversity, inclusion, and equity. This study will be conducted on grounds that authentic leaders experience various problems in efforts to create harmony in a workplace with many workers from different backgrounds. To achieve the purpose of the study, a qualitative experiment will be carried out using the case study design. A post-intervention interview will be conducted with the research participants to understand their views regarding the levels of diversity, equity, and inclusivity.

Since this study will include human subjects, the researcher expects to experience several issues relating to ethics. Researchers generally face a wide range of ethical issues in nearly all stages of a study ranging from study design to reporting. One of the major ethical issues that is likely to be experienced in this study is the unintentional exposure of the identities of research participants. Protecting the confidentiality or anonymity of research participants is one of the major issues in case-centered qualitative studies (Roller & Lavrakas, 2015). Given the nature of the phenomenon under investigation, the researcher will work closely with the study participants over a period of time. Data will be collected from participants using interviews, which will involve working with participants closely. The interviews will focus on the perceptions of each employee regarding the levels of equity, diversity, and inclusivity in the workplace based on the leadership style of the leaders. Through this process, the researcher could unintentionally disclose the identity of participants as they share their personal stories and views regarding the phenomenon under investigation. Moreover, the likelihood of disclosing such details is high because the study participants may give a detailed account of their experiences with the leadership style of their leaders. As participants provide detailed accounts of their experiences and views, the researcher may end up disclosing their identities when creating a research report and fail to protect the confidentiality and anonymity of participants.

Secondly, the researcher is likely to experience challenges relating to safety. As previously indicated, the study seeks to collect data from workers regarding the leadership styles of their superiors. Many individuals in the target population are likely to fear participating in the study for fear that the data they provide could be used against them. Such fear emanates from the fact that the proposed study deals with a sensitive issue that could result in the victimization of the workers. While the researcher could undertake measures to assure participants of confidentiality, most of them are likely to avoid participating in the study voluntarily for fear of victimization. Dongre & Sankaran (2016) note that study participants in case-centered studies are usually concerned about confidentiality and privacy because of sensitive topics among other factors. Roberts (2015) notes that ethical challenges are likely to emerge when a research study handles sensitive content of data that could potentially impact participants.

The third probable ethical issue is the misrepresentation of participants’ views during the data collection process. The nature of the research issue requires establishing honest and open communication between the researcher and study participants. However, the researcher needs to ensure that participants’ responses are not misrepresented, which is a major ethical issue. This could be a major issue because the data collection process will involve recording the interviews and creating transcripts. During this process, the researcher may end up misrepresenting the participants’ responses due to various factors including information bias and confirmation bias, which could present serious ethical challenges (West & Kreuter, 2018). The probable failure to ensure data accuracy when obtaining data using interviews is critical to enhancing the findings of this study.