This blog is a part of the Occupational Therapy paper Participation in Occupation One. The blog focuses on people’s participation in meaningful occupation. It will explore different technologies and the engagement in occupation of people who have occupational needs. It will consider how technology can be used to enhance therapy services for a client.

Wednesday 16 May 2012

Week One – Information Technology and Ethical Issues


Information technology is “the study, design, development, implementation, support or management of infotech". Information technology is a general term that describes any technology that helps to produce, manipulate, store, communicate, and/or disseminate information” (Wikipedia, 2012).

Information technology is very prevalent in todays society, it is everywhere you turn and very common place. It is forever changing, adapting and getting more and more advanced. This causes demands on society to continue updating or improving their technology to keep up with the changes.

I use many IT devices in my day to day life, most commonly my laptop and phone, but am also have an ipod and digital camera, and commonly use social networking sites and emails.

A form of technology that I have noticed is used a lot during my fieldwork placements has been a digital camera. A placement I attended at a school placement used digital cameras for taking photos of the students and their artworks. Teachers took photos of their students and hung them up in the staff room with their names underneath so that the teachers could easily identify the students and build rapport with them as the teachers will know their name, even if they don’t teach the child. They also used the digital camera to take photo’s of the students artwork so that it could be posted in the school news letter, or if the child chose to take their artwork home, the teachers would still have a copy. The other form of technology that is commonly used in practice is a computer. They store and write student notes, school reports, and be used during meetings.

Even if IT systems and devices are helpful there can also be ethical implications that need to be addressed when using them, the main being privacy. Common privacy issues that can be overlooked is did a person agree to that information being taken, what will it be used for and who else has access to it. This is common with photographs, especially if they are used on social media websites.

Definitions
Computer Ethics - “is a branch of practical philosophy which deals with how computing professionals should make decisions regarding professional and social conduct” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_ethics)

Intellectual Property - “is a term referring to a number of distinct types of creations of the mind for which property rights are recognised--and the corresponding fields of law. Under intellectual property law, owners are granted certain exclusive rights to a variety of intangible assets, such as musical, literary, and artistic works; discoveries and inventions; and words, phrases, symbols, and designs. Common types of intellectual property include copyrights, trademarks, patents, industrial design rights and trade secrets in some jurisdictions” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectual_property).

Social Justice - “is the application of the concept of justice on a social scale” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_justice).

Informed Consent - “is a phrase often used in the law to indicate that the consent a person gives meets certain minimum standards” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Informed_consent).

From these definitions it is important to recognise the use of ITC in practice, as every therapist needs to be aware of how information is being used, where it is going and who has access to it. Without this it could lead to individuals privacy being broken.

2 comments:

  1. Hi Nicole,
    I really enjoyed reading you post on IT and ethical considerations. I see that you use IT on a day-to-day basis, what IT device would you say that you use most often?

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  2. Hi Ashley,

    I would use my phone the most often by far as it is portable, a good source of communication and also has the internet.

    Thank you for your comment!

    Nicole

    ReplyDelete