Alma professor authors new textbook

KYLE SCHECK
PHOTOGRAPHER

LILLIE ROUTOWICZ
STAFF WRITER

1/26/2026

In this day and age, it is becoming increasingly rare to search for a friend on social media and come back empty-handed. Whether it be Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok, or a multitude of other social networking apps, social media has undoubtedly woven itself into the patterns and tasks of everyday life. Rarer still, however, is the presence of engaging conversations surrounding the ethics existing within the inner workings of social media.

In the grand scheme of things, social media is a relatively new area of study. As such, textbooks can be few and far between. The textbooks and journals that are available for study tend to be costly and often fail to engage students in the course material. This is precisely what one Alma College professor set out to rectify.

“I was stuck between a rock and a hard place,” said Dr. Douglas Campbell, professor of philosophy at Alma College and author of “The Ethics of Social Media.”

Determined to overcome the barriers, Campbell wrote his own textbook and centered the course around it. He sought out an affordable publisher in an effort to help his students get the most out of the course for minimal expense. The textbook was released in September 2025 by Hackett Publishing Company and is available for purchase through Amazon or the Alma College bookstore for fewer than twenty dollars.

“I don’t think you should assign to students things that are really expensive,” said Campbell.

Predating the book is the course that inspired it all. During his time teaching at the University of Toronto, Campbell worked to design a course surrounding the ethics of social media. 

“I was able to write a book around that subject, but I was also designing a whole course that was really built with the most interesting topics, in my own opinion, with topics that students want to talk about,” said Campbell.

Having taught the course for several years, Campbell noted that students tend to be interested in the same ethical dilemmas year after year, with influencer culture, pornography, misinformation, and polarized political culture making the top of the list.

Campbell emphasized his desire for the course to help students successfully debate both sides of an argument. The intention behind the course is not to change his students’ positions, but to help them stand firm in their pre-existing stances.

“I want people to be able to reason well about the dilemmas instead of rehearsing the same old sound bites again and again,” said Campbell.

While the textbook is applicable and available to students worldwide, Campbell wrote the book with Alma College students in the forefront of his mind.

“Alma College students were part of the brainstorming of the future of the course over the past few years,” said Campbell.

He attributed much of the book’s material to his former students’ support and excitement in the course. Additionally, he even mentioned several of his former Ethics of Social Media students in the acknowledgments of the book.

Whether you use social media or not, Dr. Campbell’s textbook provides crucial insight into the ins and outs of social media companies’ inner workings, while simultaneously shining a new light on mundane scrolling habits. Evidently, social media is here to stay. “Ethics of Social Media” is a must-read in navigating this ever-changing digital world.