Ethical Considerations in Research on User Feedback

Collecting and using user feedback as a method to support requirements engineering, might undermine user rights. This becomes apparent when looking at related areas, e.g., research in user experience, where collecting user feedback also plays an important role. In such settings, researchers need to ensure that the stakeholders' rights and integrity are respected. This paper identifies and discusses some of the ethical challenges and issues a researcher can face, using an example case. Focusing on user feedback, this case can serve as an example for CrowdRE, i.e. several of our findings might apply to CrowdRE in general. However, further research is needed as our work mainly reflects the challenges experienced by the authors of this paper.