Researching Young People’s Experiences: An African-Centred Perspective of Consent and Ethics

There are challenges and complexities in applying Anglo-Western-based hegemonic ethics, specifically the principle of informed consent, to researching young Africans’ academic experiences. There is a need to discuss and reflect upon an African-centred ethics framework in the design and implementation of the consent process in research, particularly educational research about young African’s academic experiences. The premise of the chapter then is the suitability of the African-centred ethical framework in navigating issues of consent in educational research, as well as an argument for its potential to reinforce values and inclusion of the young people in research that uncovers, recognises and acknowledges their experiences in a way that previous research has failed to do. This chapter focuses on the context-specific reality, process and dilemma of African-centred consent grounded in the author’s experience of researching the independent learning experiences of a small group of Nigerian students in Nigeria and England.