Mood study prompts Facebook research policy change

PanARMENIAN.Net - Facebook has announced that it is changing its policy on research in light of the controversial News Feed mood study it conducted in 2012, Digital Spy said.

In June, it emerged that the social network had conducted a secret test on almost 700,000 users, to establish the effects of being exposed to positive and negative status updates.

The revelation was heavily criticised by many, prompting an apology from the social media giant.

Three months on, Facebook has set out a new policy on the way it does experiments, which will include a new "enhanced review process" before any research takes place and a panel to ensure guidelines are met.

"It is clear now that there are things we should have done differently," Facebook CTO Mike Schroepfer admitted in a blog post.

"For example, we should have considered other non-experimental ways to do this research. The research would also have benefited from more extensive review by a wider and more senior group of people."

New engineers will also have to undergo a six-week research education training programme from now on, while all of Facebook's research activity will now be published in one place online, which it promises to update regularly.