Social networking ethics: Developing best practices for the new small world.

Emerging trends online, and especially in social network sites, may be creating an environment for psychologists where transparency is increasingly unavoidable. Thus, most psychological practitioners may now have to engage in small world ethics—ethical acuity that requires an application of ethical principles to the increasingly interconnected and transparent world that is burgeoning from online culture. Fortunately, rural psychology has already provided a helpful roadmap for how to demonstrate flexibility and prudence when applying ethical principles in cultures with great transparency. Therefore, professional psychologists and psychologists in training may need to draw upon this wisdom when conceptualizing best online practices for the field that relate to social networking and personal online activity. To remain relevant, psychotherapy must adapt to the new digital culture but maintain its identity as a profession guided by its historical values and ethical principles.