ABSTRACT
In recent years, qualitative research has become widespread around the world, including in Japan. In some cases, traditional Western principles of research ethics simply cannot be applied to fieldwork and interviewing. It is not uncommon for researchers conducting qualitative research in Japan to encounter such situations. This chapter, after redefining ethics, discusses the ethical issues often encountered when conducting cross-cultural research in a broad sense, comparing the cases reported in this book with those found in Japan. In particular, it focuses on the topics of ‘informed consent’, ‘rapport’, and ‘confidentiality’. If we think that culture is also one such situation, it is necessary to reconsider various ethical cases from the perspective of situationism, which is currently attracting attention as a viewpoint for considering research ethics. This chapter attempts to apply that practice and provides examples of how to capture ethics dynamically rather than statically.
