Troubling understandings of childhood competence in research ethics governance processes: Implications for research with children and their families

Abstract

2024 marked the centenary of the 1924 Declaration on the Rights of the Child. The adoption of this declaration by the League of Nations provided the launching pad for the establishment of a global children’s rights movement which resulted in foregrounding children’s wellbeing at key global fora during the 20th century. While the concept of children’s rights has expanded in the 100 years since the adoption of the declaration, some of the key tenets of the conceptualisation of children’s rights within this declaration remain evident in dominant children’s rights discourses today. Specifically, there remains a clear distinction between children and adults which situates the state of adulthood as being everything that those within the childhood phase of life lack – autonomy, maturity, competence, and knowledge of the world. These systems are not only evident in educational settings and the approaches adopted by governmental and non-governmental agencies (national and international); they are also identifiable within the higher education sector, most notably in Western Europe and North America, through, for instance, ethics governance procedures or procedural ethics frameworks which are best characterised by research ethics committees/IRBs. The inclusion of such a vision of childhood in university ethics regimes which, then, informs ethical standards that need to be met by researchers seeking to undertake research with children is problematic because not all cultures, including some within Western European and North American contexts, make the same distinctions between the state of adulthood and the state of childhood and consequently, they do not automatically associate incompetence, immaturity and dependency with childhood. This raises more, not less, issues. Therefore, this paper seeks to explore the linkage between dominant children’s rights discourses and procedural ethics frameworks and problematise their understanding of childhood, especially concerning the concept of competence, in contexts where other conceptualisations of childhood exist.

Introduction

2024 marked the centenary of the 1924 Declaration on the Rights of the Child or the Geneva Declaration. The adoption of this declaration by the League of Nations arguably provided the launching pad for the establishment of a global children’s rights movement which resulted in the foregrounding of issues relating to children’s wellbeing and welfare at key global fora during the course of the 20^th century. While the concept of children’s rights has expanded in the 100 years since the adoption of the 1924 Declaration on the Rights of the Child, some of the key tenets of the conceptualisation of children’s rights within this declaration remain evident in dominant children’s rights discourses today. In particular, despite more recent conceptualisations of children’s rights underscoring the notion of children as social actors who can contribute to their societies as evidenced by the so-called participatory related articles in the 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child, there remains a clear distinction between children and adults, both of whom are often discussed as a uniform group. This distinction situates the state of adulthood as being everything that those within the childhood phase of life lack – autonomy, maturity, competence, and knowledge of the world. In this way not only has childhood become seen as different from adulthood, but it has also become recognised as inferior. As a result of this increasingly widespread understanding of childhood (and indeed, adulthood) in policy and public discourses, in particular, systems have been put in place to restrict, or at least regulate, the space for this group to enact their agency, autonomy, capability, and competence.

These systems are not only evident in educational settings and the approaches of governmental and non-governmental agencies (national and international). They are also apparent within the higher education sector, most notably in institutions in Western Europe and North America, through, for instance, ethics governance procedures or procedural ethics frameworks which are best characterised by institutional research ethics committees/Institutional Review Boards (IRBs) and the attendant bureaucracy that underpins them (Hanson et al., 2023; Okyere, 2018; Powell et al., 2023; Skelton, 2008; Van Goidsenhoven and Schauwer, 2022). The inclusion of such a vision of childhood in university ethics regimes which, then, inform ethical standards that need to be met by researchers seeking to undertake research with children is problematic due to the fact that not all cultures, including some within Western European and North American contexts, make the same distinctions between the states of adulthood and childhood and as a result, they do not automatically associate incompetence, immaturity, and dependency with the childhood phase of life (see Twum-Danso Imoh, 2022). It is important to make clear that a distinction needs to be made between the ethics procedures and protocols of institutions and the individuals who make up research ethics committees as some demonstrate an appetite for flexibility in their attitudes and behaviours, but yet are restricted by the constraints of their institutional research governance frameworks. This notwithstanding, this dissonance between ethical standards and the realities of some children’s lives within certain cultural contexts in both the Global North and Global South, arguably, raises more, not less, ethical dilemmas for researchers trying to apply university ethical procedures to their research with children in such contexts.

Therefore, this paper seeks to explore the dissonance that can emerge between university ethics regimes and their attendant procedures and the reality of undertaking research with children in contexts which have different understandings of both childhood and adulthood. Focusing especially on the notion of competence, this paper will explore how different conceptualisations of this notion result in distinct ways of thinking about obtaining informed consent from children under the age of 16 or 18 depending on the research regulations found in a given context. In exploring these dilemmas examples will be drawn from research with children from marginalised communities in Ghana and England. Following a discussion of the tensions that emerge between the lived realities of researching children from communities with different understandings of, and hence, approaches to, childhood competence, the paper will then reflect on the strategies needed for the establishment of more meaningful and relational ethics practices.

The distinction between childhood and adulthood: The basis of dominant children’s rights discourses

It is widely recognised that the dominant children’s rights framework which pervades contemporary discourses and practices around conceptualisations of childhood and approaches to childcare and protection emerged out of Western European and North American child saving movements which had, as their central premise, the idea that childhood was fundamentally distinct from adulthood (Cunningham, 2012; Hendrick, 1997; Wells, 2015). This distinction was seen to be characterised by attributes associated with childhood such as innocence, purity, immaturity, vulnerability, and incompetence. These attributes created a situation whereby childhood became seen as a period that needed to be protected and cared for. While this distinction ensured that new strategies were adopted to protect the status of childhood, it also resulted in this phase of life becoming perceived as more inferior to adulthood as its so-called inherent features also served to indicate that this phase of life lacked something that adulthood possessed - making it somewhat deficient. This consequently resulted in increasing the control over, and regulation of, children - primarily by so-called superior adults – professionals, in particular, who were, by the end of the 19^th century in Europe, North America and Latin America (at least in relation to certain groups of children) charged with governing this reconstructed understanding of childhood and ensuring it applied to those now categorised as ‘children’ in their context (Cunningham, 2012; Hendrick, 1997). This was effectively achieved through the establishment of relevant institutions such as schools which facilitated the process. It was due to these features that came to characterise the dominant construction of childhood in Western Europe and North America by the early 20^th century that led Bob Corbett (1985) to posit, in a review of Philippe Ariès’ seminal work, Centuries of Childhood, that societies in Western Europe and North America have nurtured children into childhood (see also Boyden, 1997).

While the origins of these developments were initially quite specific to Western Europe and North America (and also to Latin America but mainly in relation to children who were White), much of this new understanding of childhood formed the basis of early children’s rights discourses which were launched onto a global platform by the passage of the Declaration on the Rights of the Child by the League of Nations in 1924 (Veerman, 1992). In the 100 years since its adoption, the concept of children’s rights has expanded and evolved due to refinements made in the 1959 Declaration and the 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child as well as its optional protocols (Twum-Danso Imoh, 2012; Veerman, 1992). The latter treaty, in particular, was seen as especially transformative in conceptualisations of children’s status in international law as not only was it a binding treaty, but it was also the first to recognise children as rights holders - subjects, not objects of international law. Thus, unlike the 1924 Declaration and the 1959 Declaration no longer were children’s rights framed as the inverted duties that benevolent adults offered to powerless and passive children; now they were seen as claims that children could assert against adults - be they States, family members or professionals (Veerman, 1992; Wells, 2015). This recognition of children as subjects of international law was instrumental in ensuring the inclusion of civil and political rights in the Convention - an act that was seen as ground-breaking as it meant that the first binding treaty on children’s rights, which ratifying governments were committed to realising within their national boundaries regardless of cultural, social, and economic context, not only sought to make provisions for children’s protection and provision rights, but it also granted them enabling rights, especially centred around the rights to freedom of expression and association (Liebel, 2012).

However, while the Convention has been framed as a step-change from previous children’s rights declarations there remain questions about the extent to which its provisions have been genuinely transformative in how children are perceived and treated in law and policy as well as in the behaviours and practices of organisations, groups, and individuals (see Twum-Danso Imoh, 2023). Specifically, in the process of formulating the rights of children the Convention, like the 1924 Declaration and the 1959 Declaration, did not seek to include children themselves in its deliberations (see also Freeman, 1992, 2000). This has resulted in a situation whereby the rights of children articulated in these treaties (and as a consequence, in the policies and programmes of diverse governmental, intergovernmental and non-governmental agencies/organisations operating at both national and international levels) are rights as they have been imagined by adults, primarily professionals based in Western governments and international organisations, most of which are based in Western Europe and North America. Further, although the Convention is unique in its recognition of children possessing civil and political rights, these are limited to children ‘having a say,’ specifically on issues affecting them as opposed to issues affecting their community or society more generally. Beyond this, it does not recognise the right of children to self-determination which would include, for example, children having the right to vote (see Josefsson and Wall, 2020; Liebel 2012; Pupavac, 2001; Twum-Danso Imoh, 2024).

The implication of these persistent questions about the Convention is that despite praise for its transformative potential (Cantwell, 2011), it continues to recognise childhood as a phase of life which is not only distinct from adulthood, but also inferior to adulthood. Consequently, it makes provisions for childhood to be subjected to adult (especially professional adult) power and control. It further continues the process of seeking to regulate the space for children to enact agency and capability, resulting in the modification of civil and political rights when applied to the notion of children’s rights as opposed to that of broader human rights. In effect, what civil and political rights mean when we talk about children’s rights is not the same as what they mean when we talk about human rights more generally. What all of this means is that despite its inclusion of civil and political rights, the Convention has continued to facilitate the shrinking of the space for children to demonstrate agency unless it is regulated, managed, or controlled by adults – a process which has its roots in 19^th century European and North American child saving movements (see Twum-Danso Imoh, 2023). The subjugation of children’s expression of agency to adult control leads Gallacher and Gallagher (2008: 503) to assert that:

The very notion of ‘empowerment’ implies that, without aid and encouragement from adult-designed ‘participatory methods,’ children cannot fully exercise their ‘agency’ in research encounters.

Therefore, it can be argued that, through the formal initiatives inspired by the Convention in the past 35 years, which aim to promote or facilitate the ability of children to participate or enact agency, strategies are actually being developed to regulate and control this group (Holszcheiter et al., 2019; Larkins, 2014; Twum-Danso Imoh, 2023; Wall, 2011). The consequence of this is the increasing dependence and reliance of children on adults and the corresponding increase in the power adults have over determining the extent to which, and the ways in which, children can express agency, especially in formal spheres. This regulation and governance of children’s lives is not only evident within global policymaking or the work of international, national, and local child-focused children’s rights organisations; this framing of the status of childhood and, indeed, the status of adulthood, has additionally filtered into broader societal discourses around childhood.

Different understandings of childhood, varying conceptualisations of competence

One area which has been impacted by children’s rights discourses is institutional research ethics frameworks which draw on the principle of ‘do no harm’ to determine what is considered good quality research. Such frameworks and their attendant protocols, when applied to those under the age of 18, require special safeguards to be applied to research processes as this group is automatically assumed to be both vulnerable and incompetent due to biological age alone (Bell, 2008; Hanson et al., 2023; Okyere, 2018; Powell et al., 2023; Skelton, 2008). This framing of childhood becomes problematic when undertaking research with children in contexts which have different understandings of what it means to be both a child and an adult and consequently conceptualise competence in different ways (Van Goidsenhoven and Schauwer, 2022). David Archard (1993:36), for example, has argued that while in Western societies adulthood is the goal, in other societies it is a process, a ‘continued becoming, a never completed maturing.’ As a result, from Archard’s perspective, such societies do not conceptualise adulthood and childhood in the same dramatically different ways as dominant social groups in modern Western societies do.

In sub–Saharan Africa, for instance, the organising principle underpinning many societies historically was centred around interdependence between individuals (see Twum-Dans Imoh, 2022, 2024). This understanding of relationality was so critical that it formed the basis of concepts and values that informed the structures of these societies historically. The most obvious example is the notion of Ubuntu, which is a Bantu philosophical and religious concept that recognises that the humanity of individuals is achieved through their social interaction with others, including those of different generations (see Abebe and Biswas, 2021). This led to a situation whereby notions of mutual aid, obligation and support were foregrounded in social relationships (Gathogo, 2008). Amongst the Akan of Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire (West Africa), Ghanaian philosopher, Kwame Gyekye (2013: 235) explains that social relations were constructed on the basis that these behaviours (relating to mutual aid, support, and obligation) made up what he calls a ‘morality of duty’. According to this standpoint, individuals are not self-sufficient and, therefore, need assistance and the good will of others to fulfil their own basic needs and personal objectives (see also Twum-Danso Imoh, 2022, 2024). These principles or values underpinning this worldview were expected to be evident in how individuals related to each other. Specifically, within this context there was an understanding that individuals not only had duties towards each other, but they also possessed rights they were entitled to claim from one another (Cobbah, 1987; Gyekye, 1996). The implications of these principles for intergenerational relationships were that adults and children depended on each other to achieve their wellbeing and personal objectives as well as broader household or family needs.

These principles are not simply descriptions of social relations amongst large sections of the population in diverse African societies of a by-gone era; they continue to remain evident in social relations in many contemporary societies across the continent. In Ghana, the persistence of the notion of interdependence between adults and children manifests itself in the understanding in numerous communities that both are expected to not only receive care from each other, but also to provide care to one another (Coe, 2016; Twum-Danso Imoh 2022, 2024). Given the interdependency that characterises the relationship between adults and children and its attendant emphasis on reciprocal obligations and the mutuality of duty between generations, I have previously asserted elsewhere that ‘it may be more appropriate to discuss more equally the dependency associated with both phases of life instead of primarily associating childhood with dependency’ (Twum-Danso Imoh, 2022: 451). This raises questions about the validity of the basis upon which we draw a linkage between the status of adulthood and the term ‘caregiver.’ This understanding of intergenerational relations is thus subsequently reflected in conceptualisations of childhood and children’s roles within a society. In particular, this understanding of personhood, and the attendant social relations that underpin it, has resulted in an understanding that childhood is a phase of life in which children are recognised as competent and capable and, therefore, are able to undertake responsibilities which are increased incrementally as they become more mature and competent – as demonstrated through the tasks they undertake (see also Lancy, 2012; Nsamenang, 2004; Serpell, 1993). The work of German anthropologist, Enid Schildkrout (1978), in northern Nigeria in the 1970s is instructive here. Specifically, her work in urban Kano led Schildkrout to conclude that as children undertook responsibilities from an early age, many of which adults relied on so they could undertake other tasks or adhere to religious or cultural practices (especially in the case of women), growing up, then, was not a case of children transitioning from being unproductive members of society to becoming productive members. This is because, as children, they were already productive members of society (see also Twum-Danso Imoh, 2024).

The significance of differing understandings of childhood competence for adherence to institutional protocols

Returning to the issue of institutional research ethics frameworks the question then becomes what happens when researchers try to apply ethics protocols which are premised on the understanding of the vulnerability, immaturity, and incompetence of those who are under the age of 18 and, therefore, categorised as children in both global and diverse national legislative and policy frameworks, to contexts where childhood, and indeed, adulthood, are not envisaged in similar ways? In relation to informed consent, for example, while in some contexts research institutional frameworks/procedural ethics require parental consent for the involvement of children under the age of 16 as well as assent from children themselves, this does not necessarily work well within contexts (in both the North and South) where childhood is not automatically associated with incompetence, dependence, and immaturity. This has emerged in my own research in Ghana and England.

First, with regards to Ghana, much of my research has taken place in poor and deprived communities in central Accra, the capital city. These are communities which have long been characterised by high levels of illiteracy and unemployment (see Twum-Danso, 2008). One of these communities is additionally characterised by high levels of teenage pregnancy, and single parent families where parents or so-called ‘caregivers’ struggle to care for their children. Therefore, there are many children in this community who do not go to school at all or who do not attend on a regular basis due to parental inability to pay the attendant school fees. Against this backdrop a lot of children, many as young as 12, fend for themselves or look for others to take care them, even if they ostensibly live in the same house as their parents/‘caregivers’ (See Twum-Danso, 2008; Twum-Danso Imoh, 2022). This situation has implications for the authority many parents can claim over their children within this community. As one child informed me, ‘parents do not talk to their children when they do something bad – because if a parent does not take care of their child, they cannot advise them’ (FGD with Ga Mashie Out of School Children III, 20^th February 2006). Thus, by failing to provide for their children’s everyday necessities, especially in relation to school fees, some parents in this community lose some influence over their children because the latter will no longer listen to, or take on board, their advice (see Twum-Danso Imoh, 2022).

The implication for my own research was that as I sought to obtain informed consent from parents and so-called caregivers in order for their children to participate in my study, I was advised by a community member who had helped me gain access to that community that there was no point in obtaining parental consent for such groups. He explained that this was because for these children whether or not their parents/‘caregivers’ consented to their participation in a research study meant little to them as they made their own decisions about what they wanted to do on a daily basis, and this included any participation in research studies. Therefore, he suggested that I focus on directly obtaining the consent of participating children themselves regardless of their age. My experience in the field is supported by the works of other Ghana-focused scholars. Ofosu-Kusi (2023), for example, has written about street and working children’s deliberate disobedience of their parents’ wishes, primarily to return home. In a recent book chapter, he illustrates how, children who have left their homes in rural areas in order to migrate to Accra to earn a living, mainly as a result of parental inability to take care of their needs, exhibit behaviours which would make parental consent meaningless in this context. Okyere (2018:628) too in his research on working children in artisanal mining in the Asante region of the country raised this issue in his description of the bemusement of both children and their caregivers as he sought to obtain informed consent from the latter for their children’s participation in his study before approaching the children themselves. As he explains:

I was consistently told by parents and guardians themselves that it was unnecessary to come to seek their permission first to discuss the research with their sons or daughters given that it was the latter whose permission or consent I really needed. The situation was further compounded when a boy at the site bluntly informed me that his peers found my insistence on seeking their parents’ or guardians’ permission before allowing them to take part in the study to be discourteous.

As a result, following rigid ethical processes in these studies resulted in a situation which not only did not make sense, but also undermined the ‘do no harm’ principle that underpins research governance as participants were alienated and felt disrespected by researchers who were trying to follow their institutional ethics protocols. That these challenges are not unique to the Ghanaian or African contexts is well illuminated by a recent conversation centred around research ethics that took place between three childhood scholars to mark the 30^th anniversary of the journal, Childhood. During this conversation, one of the participants, Jessica Taft, reflected on the hold dominant child protection principles, used without recognition of children’s capacity for agency, had on her own research which has primarily been undertaken in Latin America:

The effects of this view of childhood are multiple and deeply troubling for critical childhood researchers as they can profoundly constrain our ability to follow other ethical imperatives including respecting children’s own understandings of their capacity, or children’s rights to participate in research. This divergence has been a central challenge in my own research, as many of the young activists who I interview have strong opinions regarding their own rights. Asking for their parents’ consent to talk to them would indicate a profound lack of understanding of their deeply-held perspectives and political positions. This would have fundamentally undermined our relationship and made it difficult for them to trust me, already an outsider in many ways, with their stories and knowledge (Hanson et al., 2023: 2).

It is important to underscore that these cultures which have different understandings of childhood are not only evident in Africa or other contexts in the Global South; they also exist in the so-called Global North. For instance, I was recently part of a non-academic research project led by the London Borough of Hillingdon, a local authority in England, which focused on Gypsy, Roma, and Traveller children’s experiences of accessing, and staying in, formal education (London Borough of Hillingdon, 2022). The findings that emerged from the study indicated that while many of these communities recognise the extent to which their ‘way of life’ in the UK is rapidly changing, there remains an emphasis on so-called traditional values in socialisation processes (London Borough of Hillingdon, 2022; see also Bhopal, 2011; Levinson, 2008; Foster and Norton, 2012). Examples of these are the assumption of early responsibility, which seeks to equip children with the skills and behaviours required for the attainment of adulthood, and ensuring that children of all genders imbibe the strict gender norms and roles which continue to prevail in the organisation of family life for many in these communities. While these persisting values had an impact on many children’s experiences of the formal education system, it also had implications for our study, especially in relation to two of the groups we were working with – Irish Traveller and English Romanichal Gypsies. It is important to note that while the latter group was part of a larger Roma migration that left India a 1000 years ago, their presence in England was first recorded in 1505 (Clark and Cemlyn 2005; Foster and Norton, 2012). Thus, they need to be recognised as distinct from other Roma groups who have more recently migrated to the UK.

With specific regards to our project, the implications of an understanding of childhood and socialisation processes centred around early responsibility and strict gender norms were especially evident in relation to the recruitment of older pre-teen and teenage boys. For this group, in particular, the socialisation process in many families foregrounded the freedom they were awarded, with some female participants of different generations referring to their sons or brothers as ‘being the boss’ at home and ‘having free will’ (London Borough of Hillingdon, 2022). As one 16-year-old female participant said about her nephew who was of primary school age as part of her attempt to explain the tensions that existed between school and home environments:

He [her nephew] doesn’t want to go to school because he’s different at home. When he’s in school he has to adjust to their ways, but at home he’s the boss. He’s got free will. He does what he wants, he goes out and plays. At school they’ve got to sit, follow rules (English Gypsy Adult and Teenagers FGD, Harefield, 2^nd April 2022).

This had an impact on our study as most of the members of those communities whom we were able to access to inform about the project consisted of almost exclusively women and girls. This was further reflected in the composition of our interviews and focus group discussions in these communities as these were comprised of mostly women and girls, with only one adult male participant (from the Irish Traveller community) and a small number of younger boys. What this meant was that while the mothers we approached gave consent for their children to participate in the research project, this parental consent was only meaningful for their daughters and some of their younger sons. For older boys in many of these families, the consent of their mother meant little for their own assent as it was acknowledged that they made their own decisions about how they structured their day, including the activities in which they engage. This final point about the consent of mothers not having an impact on whether older pre-teen or teenage boys aged under 16 in English Romanichal Gypsy or Irish Traveller communities also assented to participate in our study further raises the issue of gendered hierarchies within other communities and its consequences for the ability of all adults to grant their informed consent to participate in a study. By this I am referring to the reality that in some communities the gender dynamics that exist may lead to a situation whereby a 15-year-old boy may be recognised as being more capable, and having more authority, to give his informed assent for his own participation in a study as well as that of a younger child compared to an adult woman due to the higher status he holds in the community as a result of his gender and despite his chronological age.

Moving towards more meaningful and relational ethical practices in negotiating consent from children

Hence, how do we move towards a more meaningful ethics practice that moves beyond procedural ethics and takes into consideration the needs and wishes of ‘real’ children and their families in relation to informed consent and the different ways they may understand or conceptualise childhood competence in their context? Put another way, how can we move towards a more relational ethics of care in childhood research? For me, I cannot see how this can be done without the adoption of a collaborative approach by ethics committees/IRBs with different groups of children to determine what they themselves find meaningful in relation to the concept of the ‘do no harm principle’ that underpins much of the research ethics governance framework when it comes to consent processes. The question for me then becomes: what would such a research ethics framework, which has been co-produced with children, look like? What would it foreground? What can it offer us in relation to how we do research with adults as well? What does the outcome of this conversation or collaboration look like depending on the identities of the children involved – bearing in mind variables such as gender, race, disability, sexual orientation, geographical location (both within national boundaries and across contexts)?

The examples focusing on children in one community in Ghana and within Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities in a London borough, both of whom live within contexts where their competence is recognised at an early age, at least in relation to consent processes, reinforce the point that only a collaborative approach with children can reveal the everyday and relational ethical principles that they value and foreground in their relationships with adults and others. Realising this earlier on in my own research in Ghana would have prevented me, as a novice researcher, which I was at the time, from initially alienating some of the young participants in my study who felt competent to make their own decisions about participating in my research in the same way that they made decisions about so many other aspects of their every day lives. Failure to focus my consent strategies more directly on these groups from the outset showed a lack of respect for not only the young people and how they perceived themselves in relation to others in their community, but also for the social and cultural context in which they were living (see also Powell et al., 2023). In relation to the project I was involved in relating to Gypsy, Roma and Traveller children, our ability to primarily access women from Irish Traveller and English Romanichal Gypsy communities during the recruitment process meant that we were not able to directly access the voices and experiences of older pre-teen and teenage boys. This led to a situation whereby while our data was rich with the experiences and the challenges older boys especially experienced in schools both academically and socially, these were gathered through the narratives of their mothers and sisters. What was lost were the direct accounts of the experiences and perspectives (and all the attendant nuances that come with such accounts) of older boys whose schooling trajectories were established during the research as being fraught with enormous, sometimes insurmountable, obstacles in relation to academic progress and social relationships with peers, teachers and school management.

This inclusion of children in the development of research ethics frameworks is important as a number of scholars have pointed out that what children may determine as harmful or ethically sound may be different from what has now been envisioned, and put in place, by ethics committees/IRBs (see Hanson et al., 2023). One noteworthy example is put forward by human geographer, Tracey Skelton (2008:24-26), who offers an account of her own childhood memory of participating in a research study undertaken by a trainee teacher in the 1970s when she was a 10-year-old child attending a very small school in an English village:

Mr. Manchester came to our school as a student teacher. He was fantastic and we ‘top juniors’ loved working with him…This period of learning was one of the most enjoyable I remember from school. One day Mr. Manchester asked if he could talk to me in private...Mr. Manchester told me that as part of his teacher training he wanted to do a project about children’s attitudes towards bad language and swearing and asked if I would like to participate. I was so excited about being asked my opinions and ideas by someone I respected. I agreed straight away. There was no form to read, no letter to take home to my mother, and no suggestion that someone should sit with me. Mr. Manchester said he would just tell the headteacher and collect his tape recorder. When he came back he explained why he wanted to use a tape recorder and I asked him who else would listen to the tape. Then we began…I absolutely loved every minute of that interview…There was no formal process of consent and yet I felt I had agreed to participate. At that age I felt I was competent to make my own decision…I felt safe in the school, and I knew the head teacher would never let one of his children get involved in something negative. Because of his approach to teaching and to us as pupils I trusted Mr. Manchester. I was, at this age, apparently competent to make judgements about the adults I had contact with and chose to talk to. I knew that I could have refused – he made this very clear...I enjoyed all of Mr. Manchester’s lessons and really valued learning from his style of teaching. Agreeing to the interview was a way I could help him; give him something back. The interview felt like a reciprocal act... I never saw the final report; it did not matter. I was much more absorbed about the interview experience and what it meant to me than wondering what he did with the material...I was just pleased to know that it was useful and helpful for him...It was the first time an adult other than my mother had been genuinely interested in my opinion. In that interview, I was given the time to talk as much as I wanted about a particular issue.

This extract is based on one individual child’s reflections and, in fact, is articulated many years after the event. Therefore, what Skelton foregrounds as important and meaningful will not necessarily be the same as another child, not even those who attended the same small village school at the same time she did. Added to that, a number of processes adopted in Skelton’s first experience of research would now go against safeguarding principles which she acknowledges. This notwithstanding, it is still valuable as an example that allows us to draw out some themes about what a lived relational ethical experience of research could look like, at least, for some children in relation to feeling able to consent meaningfully to participation in a research study. First, the study was undertaken within a context in which the child felt safe – not only within the broader environment of the school, but also in relation to the specific relationship with the teacher undertaking the research whom she trusted (see also Van Goidsenhoven and Schauwer, 2022). Second, the value of reciprocity in relationships between children and adults emerges as important as this child felt that her participation gave her an opportunity to give back to an adult she respected and from whom she had learnt a lot. This is also something that has been illuminated by Abebe (2009:461) in his research in Ethiopia when he makes the point that reciprocity is critical to research processes as ‘dominant ethical principles are actually lived in, reproduced, and experienced by research participants through interactions’ (see also Spyros, 2023). This underscores the importance of considering relationality in research processes that seek to adhere to ethical behaviours that child participants actually value. Finally, and importantly for this paper’s purposes, the Skelton example demonstrates how the child viewed her own competence in the process. In particular, with regards to informed consent, while no formal processes were undertaken with either the child or her parents, the young Skelton felt that she had the competence to understand the purpose of the project and that she felt confident that she had been able to make an informed decision herself about participating in the interview. While understanding the need to adhere to safeguarding processes, Skelton’s reflections around the consent process and, notably, her view that, as a child she was competent to make the decision at that age to consent to research in the absence of any processes involving her parents, indicates the extent to which gaining an understanding about what is safe and ethical in child research or, indeed, any kind of interaction with children, cannot be achieved without direct engagement, or dialogue, with diverse groups of children themselves (see also Powell et al., 2023). Without engaging children in these discussions decisions made by ethics committees/IRBs about appropriate ethical approaches with children will continue to remain disconnected from the everyday lives and practices of large sections of this group.

It is worth noting that this idea of exploring how we can reimagine research ethics with children does not mean involving only children, but rather it underscores the need to attend to broader issues of power and positionality in research ethics. The current research ethics frameworks found in most Western European and North American higher educational institutions have their roots in the Nuremberg Code (an outcome of the Nuremberg trials which ended in 1947) (Bell, 2008). The significance of this is that essentially, they have been developed by academic institutions populated by professionals and academics who were mainly drawn from middle-class sections of European and North American societies. Therefore, the adults who interact closely with children on a daily basis, especially those from poor and marginalised communities, either in the Global North or the Global South, have also, like the children in their charge, been excluded from conversations about what meaningful and ‘lived’ research ethics principles should look like in relation to researching their children, or, indeed, themselves. Thus, any attempt to reimagine the notion of research ethics, which governs relationships between adult researchers and child participants, must involve both children and the adults who have the most impact on their daily lives. Critical to this approach must be the troubling of understandings of childhood competence in research ethics governance, with a focus on engaging with children in communities that have been marginalised in order to understand what they value and what they view to be important with regards to informed consent and broader research processes in which they are involved. To do this requires ethics committees/IRBs to operate in less rigid, more flexible, less standardised, and more collaborative ways. As noted earlier there are some members of ethics committees/IRBs who already demonstrate an inclination for more flexible and collaborative attributes. In my own experience these members have been instrumental in helping me to ultimately gain ethical approval for my original ethics applications or any amendments submitted for studies I have undertaken over the last 22 years. However, such members still operate within research governance frameworks that are restrictive and impede their ability to adopt a flexible, collaborative and relational approach on a systematic basis, leading to a situation whereby there are inconsistencies in approaches and decisions made by ethics committees, not only between different higher education institutions, but also within departments in a single institution.

Conclusion

Drawing on the concept of competence, this paper has sought to illuminate how conceptualisations and lived experiences of childhood competence vary from dominant research ethics frameworks, not only in relation to many societies in the Global South, but also in relation to certain communities in the Global North. This results in a situation whereby attempts to apply standard ethics protocols, which foreground consent from parents as well as assent from children below a certain age, can end up creating tensions and problems due to what is seen as a perceived failure of the researcher to treat some groups of children with the respect that their own community shows to them. In this way research protocols which seek to ‘do no harm’ can lead to actually ‘doing harm’ and moreover, can end up being meaningless within a given research context. Therefore, there is a need to explore how we can move towards more ‘lived’ research ethics principles, which not only consider the lived realities of different groups of children, but also enable professionals and academics to collaborate with children and their families, especially those from marginalised communities, in the production of a more meaningful and relational ethics framework governing research studies involving children.