Conflict and Health. Ethical considerations for children’s participation in data collection activities during humanitarian emergencies: A Delphi review. 2017.
The authors of this paper recognize the need for child data collection in emergency settings and acknowledges that such activities may expose children to risks. The objective of the study is to identify expert consensus on whether or not children should participate in data collection activities in humanitarian emergency situations. The study utilizes a three-round Delphi technique and the results are:
- “respondents strongly supported children’s right to participate in data collection in humanitarian settings, while also recognizing that protecting children from harm may ‘override’ the participation principle in some contexts.
- “Respondents identified capacity and contextual considerations as important factors influencing participation decisions, though they sometimes disagreed about how these factors should determine participation.
- Respondents also considered the role of individual child factors and the presence of caregivers in selecting child participants, and proposed best practice approaches for securing children’s safe and meaningful participation” – such as the use of contextual risk analyses to determine whether children should participate in a given initiative. “