Module one discussion board - Essay Example

Market research primarily collects data to meet the changing requirements s and correlate it with the business objectives to produce goodsand services. The data is collated to address the needs of business and customers. Authenticity of data therefore is of prime importance which would reflect actual requirements. With increased diverse society, the market imperatives vis-à-vis changing preferences of people, target segmentation, consumption trends and macro factors become vital issues that need to be addressed for fulfilling clients’ needs.

The research design and field work must be conducted properly so as to address the problems accurately. Hence, enforcing strict code of ethics becomes very important part of market research (Hunt and Vitell,1986). The companies can enforce ethics in market research by getting feedback directly from the participants and double check their responses to check the authenticity of data that is to be analyzed. Special precaution must be adhered so as not to influence respondents’ responses. The manipulated responses generate misleading results that could jeopardize the actions of the clients in addressing their problems (Sales and Folkman, 2000; Sparks and Hunt, 1998).

The personal interview schedule is most susceptible to crossing ethical boundaries. The covert and overt dimension of the research is major element that blurs the distinction between the subjects’ right to privacy and the public’s right to know. As such mutual trust needs to be developed to elicit right responses which would accurately reflect respondents’ views. Stringent punishment must be enforced when trust is violated between respondents and researcher or between researcher and client.

(words: 245)ReferenceHunt, S. D. & Vitell, S. J. (1986). A general theory of marketing ethics. Journal ofMacromarketing, 6, 5-16.Sales, B. D. & Folkman, S. (Eds.). (2000). Ethics in research with human participants. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.Sparks, J. R. & Hunt, S. D. (1998). Marketing researcher ethical sensitivity:Conceptualization, measurement, and exploratory investigation. Journal of Marketing, 62, 92-109.