Navigating Uncertainty - study information
Welcome and thank you for your interest in this study! Below, we would like to inform you about the aims, procedure and conditions of the study. Please read this information carefully. If you understood everything and have no further questions, you can give your consent to participate on the next page.
Purpose of the Study
This study investigates how personal life experiences relate to the way people interpret and make sense of ambiguous situations. We are particularly interested in how people form initial impressions of situations and whether their impressions change as new information becomes available. This research aims to contribute to a better scientific understanding of the cognitive processes behind interpretations in individuals who have experienced potentially traumatic life events. By participating, you help advance research that may ultimately help the development of more targeted psychological interventions for trauma-affected individuals.
Study Procedure
Only people who have
made at least one potentially traumatic experience will be eligible to participate. This will be examined through two brief screening questions you will
complete first. If you are eligible and decide to participate in the study, the
procedure will be as follows: First, you will complete several short questionnaires about your current wellbeing, thoughts, and experiences. Next, you
will complete a task in which you read short scenarios from every day life
situations and rate the plausibility of four different possible interpretations of
each situation. As you receive more information about each scenario, you will be
asked to update your ratings. Finally, you will answer a few sociodemographic
questions such as age, gender, and level of education. The study will take about 20-25 minutes. As a
financial compensation, you will be paid £4.50 through Prolific.
Eligibility
People who have
experienced at least one potentially traumatic life event can participate in the
study. A diagnosed mental disorder is not required for eligibility. Further
eligibility criteria are: minimum age of 18 years and sufficient English
language skills.
Potential disadvantages and risks
Please note that this study involves reading possibly threatening scenarios and questionnaires that might concern distressing content related to traumatic experiences. Reading these materials may briefly evoke emotional distress related to past traumatic experiences. If you experience distressing symptoms at any of the assessment points, you will find support resources available at findahelpline.com at any time. Even though no long-term disadvantages are expected, please do not hesitate to reach out to the study team, if you feel unwell after completing the study.
For your wellbeing, we ask you to refrain from participation, if you are currently experiencing an acute mental health crisis, such as acute suicidal thoughts, a psychotic episode, or a very recent traumatic event. If this applies to you, we encourage you to seek support at findahelpline.com.
You may withdraw your consent to participate at any time without providing a reason and without facing any disadvantages.
Compensation
guidelines
Payment of £4.50 via Prolific will be provided upon completion of the study.
Participants who do not meet the eligibility criterion of prior trauma exposure are not entitled to compensation.
To ensure your submission is approved, the following conditions must be met:
- The completion time must fall within a realistic range. We therefore
reserve the right to withhold compensation if the completion time is implausibly short (<10 minutes) or implausibly long (>90 minutes)
-
All tasks are completed conscientiously. Unrealistic response patterns indicating random or automated input, or failure to pass attention checks, may result in exclusion from compensation
-
All eligibility criteria are met at the time of participation: minimum age of 18 years, sufficient English language skills, prior exposure to at least one potentially traumatic life event, and absence of an acute mental health crisis.
If it later turns out that one of
these requirements was not met, compensation cannot be paid.
Voluntary participation and withdrawal
Participation in the
study is voluntary. You may withdraw your consent to participate at any time
without giving a reason, and doing so will not result in any disadvantages. If you wish to delete your data, you can only do so while you are working on the study by clicking "Leave and delete my data". Your data will then be deleted immediately.
Should you choose to withdraw, please follow the steps to receive your partial compensation of £1:
- Copy the following code:
CUEFRGXM
- Return to Prolific
- Enter the code to confirm your withdrawal, so we can review and approve a compensation of £1 for your time
Please make a note of this code before you proceed to the next page, to ensure you can receive your partial compensation should you choose to withdraw from the study at any point.
Data protection
The
data collected as part of the study will be treated as strictly confidential in accordance
with data protection regulations (Section 40 of the Federal Data Protection Act)
and the duty of confidentiality. The data is collected in anonymised form. Due
to the anonymised data, it will not be possible for you to delete your data
once the data entry is completed. The anonymised data will be retained
for a further 10 years in accordance with legal provisions. Your data will be
used exclusively for analyses within the context of the study. The anonymised
results of the study may be published as academic papers and made available to
other researchers for transparent review on the ‘Open Science Framework’ – with
the socio-demographic variables removed. The data is transmitted via a secure
(encrypted) connection and no IP addresses are stored. The provider’s server is
located in Germany. Once the survey has been completed, the data will be
deleted from the server (by 31 December 2027 at the latest).
Should you have any
further questions regarding our study or are interested in the results of this study, please feel free to contact us. The
contact details for the study management are:
Prof. Dr. Tobias Kube
Email:
tobias.kube@rptu.de
Phone:
+49 6341-28035654
B.Sc. Katja Straßburger
Georg-August-Universität Göttingen
katja.strassburger@stud.uni-goettingen.de
A copy of this study information is available for download here.
