by Olivia

Special Interest group

Ethics and Law

What is Ethics and Law?

What do we mean by ‘ethics and law’? To put it simply, ethics provide principled guidance for action, and laws are rules enacted by the state or applied/  recognised by courts. Laws, which may be based on ethical principles, are enforceable rules with penalties for those who do not comply with them. While ethical principles and laws can be stated plainly, applying them to specific instances may not be as straightforward. Novel aspects of new and emerging e-mental health initiatives can raise perplexing ethical and legal dilemmas.

About the Group

We are excited to present a special interest group within eMHIC that explores e-mental health initiatives through the lenses of ethics and law. With that in mind and as the primary aim, we hope to generate discussion and reflection of pressing issues for the field. 

Learn about Ethics and Law

Articles

In upcoming newsletters this year, we will be offering ethico-legal think pieces, updates, hypotheticals and commentaries, from ourselves or guest contributors.  Click on the links to read the full articles.

Learn From Subject Matter Experts

Group Chairs

Richman Wee

Senior Researcher, University of Waikato, New Zealand

Piers Gooding

Senior Research Fellow, University of Melbourne, Australia

Nick Titov

Executive Director, Mindspot, Australia

Want to start collaborating?

Join The Discussion Forum

You are welcome to join our Ethics and Law discussion forum, available to eMHIC members under the ‘Member Access’ section. Head over there to start or join a discussion on this topic.

Join the discussion

Don't forget to join a discussion forum on your topic of interest!

Victoria Hornby

CEO, Mental Health Innovations, UK

International Phone and Text Helplines

Victoria is CEO of Mental Health Innovations, the charity behind SHOUT, the UK’s first 24/7 crisis text service. From 2011 to 2017, she was Director of Programmes at The Royal Foundation, building a portfolio of projects including the Invictus Games, Coach Core, United for Wildlife and Heads Together.