Themes

Clarifying the aims of a research study

What is this about?

Ensuring that there are no misunderstandings regarding the study amongst prospective and current participants in a study has a number of practical implications. For example, Williams, Irvine, McGinnis, McMurdo & Crombie (2007) conducted a follow-up study on a group of individuals who opted out of a prior cross-sectional study when invited to take part. Although 54% of the individuals contacted refused to participate in the initial study, 61% of this original sample opted to participate in the follow-up study. They identified that the majority of this 61% opted out of the original study due to misunderstandings regarding the research process itself. This is significant as a small participant sample may result in delayed publication of the research, an increase in research costs, and sampling bias (Williams et al., 2007).

For whom is this important?

Academic institutionsAcademic staffAdvisors of studentsAll stakeholders in researchBachelor studentsClinical ethics consultantsClinical researchersCollaborating researchersDoctoral studentsEthics committee membersGeneral public

What are the best practices?

Horng and Grady (2003) illustrated a few practical examples where it was essential to ensure that prospective study participants had a clear understanding of the aims, results and benefits of the study being conducted. For example, they described the case of a 63-year-old man with advanced colon cancer who wished to participate in the clinical trial for testing the safety of a new chemotherapy agent. The investors interviewed the participant prior to conducting the study, and identified that he was misunderstanding the aim of the trial, and the risks involved in participating in a clinical trial for a previously-untested chemotherapy agent.

Another relevant example comes from my own research study for my Masters with the University of Malta, which is currently ongoing. The study involves gathering language information from foreign children who reside in Malta, and whose parents speak another language it home. It was observed that some of the parents misunderstood the aims and the predicted results of the research. Most notably, a few participants responded to the participant recruitment notice believing that I would be providing their children with Maltese and English lessons. Therefore, I had to clarify to these prospective participants the aims of the research I was conducting and the results which I was aiming to obtain, which would reflect the natural progression of the development of their child’s language level. Upon this clarification, some of the prospective participants still opted to participate in the study. Understandably, others chose to withdraw from the study.

Natalie Evans, Raquel Ann Borg Cutajar contributed to this theme. Latest contribution was Aug 11, 2022

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