I am a counseling psychologist in training researching closeness in couples where one member is diagnosed with an Autism Spectrum Disorder. I am finding it hard to recruit participants and am now using twitter and Facebook to advertise my research. I do not want to influence responses so have kept my research identity separate from my username but what are the implications of this? Should I be more transparent? Are there other issues of which I should be aware?
If you are a researcher in training, I assume your project was approved by your institutional review board (IRB) that has the duty of evaluating your research in terms of research design, ethics, etc. What did they say? If you don't have IRB approval then you shouldn't be carrying out the research as there are ethical issues of informed consent, etc.
If you have institutional review board ethics approval and also have the support of your sponsoring and or host institution(s), then the relevant information may be able to be disseminated by these organizations social media sites. It is increasingly common to see social media sites being used to enlist participants into research studies.
I also suggest you seek opportunities for disseminating information about this research via relevant advocacy and or professional societies.
Just to be clear, my research does have ethical approval and I am not conducting research without informed consent. I was advised by my college that social media is fine ethically. However, I wanted to open the debate up to the research community so that i could be assisted in thinking through all the implications. It is reassuring to know that social media sites are being used increasingly. I am also using the Research Autism website and the National Autism Society website. I have also enlisted the help of couple therapists specialising in autism to advertise my research. Thank you to Deborah Jean Verran for your suggestion of advocacy and professional societies. I can give that a try too.
If your messaging is IRB approved, you will do well. It is better to create a profile specifically for your research, not your personal profile, to communicate with potential participants. FB ads can be very targeted to marital status, interests, location, etc., which can help. You might find our webinar on using social media in clinical research helpful.
http://ctndisseminationlibrary.org/display/1021.htm
I think it is good to get in contact with community gatekeepers such as group admins and people like that. I would recommend to be open about yourself to them and explain your goals and expectations in the communication. Try getting in conact and after that you can prepare text blocks for advertising to let the admins use them.
One of the things I have encountered using social media for recruitment purposes is that people who do not actually have a diagnosis but suspect they are on the spectrum will respond. This might not be an ethical issue for you if you are qualified to make a diagnosis as part of your practice. I am not... communicating a diagnosis, limits of practice, boundaries between research and clinical roles... it has been a challenge. I no longer use social media sites to find control participants.
- Badges
- Science topic
- Similar topics
- Linguistics
- Composition Studies
- Publication