Methodological and ethical considerations in researching social media posts about drill music

James Alexander

Chapter 8 in Research Handbook on Youth Criminology, 2025, pp 127-142 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: This chapter draws on research that included analysis of drill music videos and interviews with their producers to discuss methodological and ethical considerations of using social media posts as data within youth crime research. Initially, the chapter draws on literature that considers how violent street culture has moved online to discuss methodological issues such as the ethical usage of open-source data and informed consent. The text then outlines findings from a study that included research with three named groups of young people who posted violent music videos online, E1S (2010–2013), 13 (2013–2016) and LSM (2017–2021), all of whom emerged from the same estate over a ten-year period. The study showed that being involved in online violence was often a temporary response to offline socio-economic marginalisation and deprivation, fuelled, in part, by the commodification of violence. However, most drill artists were not involved in instances of physical violence. The chapter illustrates how including the voices of drill artists helps develop a fuller analysis of their posts while highlighting the importance of exploring the temporary nature of violent online personas, rather than representing them as fixed attributes.

Keywords: Desistance; Drill music; Online research; Social media; Youth violence (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
ISBN: 9781035300747
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