Is my dissertation feasible?

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psychstudent90

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Hi everyone,

I'm currently a MSc Health Psychology international student studying in the UK. I have nearly finished all of my coursework, so will be eligible for a Postgraduate Diploma of Health Psych in June, but am hoping to get my MSc when my dissertation is due in September.

I spoke to my supervisor via email before coming to the UK (from Australia) to discuss potential dissertation topics, and it seemed that our research interests were aligned and that I was going to be able to pursue the topic of my choice. Unfortunately once I arrived, she said we couldn't do what I wanted to do, because it would not be an original project, and she gave me a project of hers on a completely different topic.

I was okay with this, and was just glad to be doing a masters in the UK, but unfortunately my project is not going well. Compared to my peers, my participant base is much smaller and very restricted - adult survivors of childhood cancer, still experiencing pain from their childhood cancer. My supervisor has not provided me with any direction, or any help in finding participants.

I have tried contacting charities and support groups (no luck), and have also found a couple of FB groups, but they are full of Americans. My supervisor has suggested making a press release, including my study and contact details in a local newspaper and asking them to come to the uni, but I'm not keen for safety reasons - and it seems a bit insensitive given the topic.

She has also suggested interviewing the Americans from the FB groups over Skype, and I'm in the process of making an ethics amendment to include it, but I'm not sure if this will really work. My thesis is due in early September, has to be 10 000 words, and I haven't started. Do you think this recruitment method is feasible? What do you think? Both my supervisor and I don't have any other ideas.

Thanks for your opinion!

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Sounds like a crummy advisor. Letting a student recruit a clinical sample without any existing way to access the population is just not good advising. If its a feasibility study that is one thing, but it sounds like that wasn't the intent. Survivorship groups are all over the place, but those still experiencing chronic physical pain narrows it down enormously. Not sure if there is a UK equivalent of NCI cancer centers, but I'd look into such places and make some connections - though if you are aiming for a September deadline it may be too late for that. I don't know the nature of your project, but I wouldn't plan on finishing anywhere near September if the idea is for this to be a finished/substantive research project (though if they would let you get away with a half-dozen qualitative interviews or so it might be feasible).

I've done a fair amount of work with cancer patients/survivors, but whether your recruitment is feasible isn't something I could answer. Interviewing over Skype seems fine if that fits with what you are trying to achieve with the study - obviously not if the purpose was some sort of in-person intervention, quantitative measures, etc.. I'm quite confused why you are reluctant to advertise in a newspaper as this is a pretty standard recruitment technique and actually one of the first many would try. Need to be careful about how you word the ad for obvious reasons, but what security reasons might exist there that wouldn't for any other recruitment technique?
 
Hi Ollie,

Thanks so much for your response. I left out a few details, sorry. My supervisor said that getting ethics to recruit through NHS hospitals wouldn't be an option as I'm an international student, and we didn't have enough time. I'll have a look into the NCI cancer centres you mentioned, thanks.

I'll hopefully be conducting in-depth qualitative semi-structured interviews. Do you think Skype is unsuitable in this case? My supervisor is hoping for approximately 16 participants, but I don't think that's very realistic at this stage.

Regarding the security, I'm just a bit nervous about posting my number/email address in a paper - it isn't vetted, so you don't really know who you'll get, and if they'll even be genuine (i.e., childhood cancer survivors). I'm here alone, and the city isn't the safest of cities, but I guess I could give that a go.

Thanks again for your help, really appreciate it!
 
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Wait - don't you have a laboratory or clinic space in which to conduct the interviews? And a work number? I certainly wouldn't recommend giving out your home number or personal email, but have no idea what kind of operation they are running. The above were assumed since I frankly, can't imagine anyone running an even semi-functional laboratory without at least a phone for participants to call. Maybe those resources are only provided to mentors who encourage students to pursue feasible studies at your university though;) I'm not sure what kind of studies other folks are running, but almost every study I have ever been involved in has entailed strangers calling/emailing the lab and then going there to participate. Save for purely online studies (which severely limits what can be done), I'm not sure what alternatives exist.

Skype has limits and I'm not sure of the security/ethics so that is something to check with your local IRB. There may or may not be ways to detect "faking" when posting an ad. Not exactly my field so I'm not sure what is standard is for that literature. I'm not sure what kind of money folks are being paid for the interviews, but if its fairly nominal that mitigates the risk of folks faking childhood cancer to some degree (how sad is it I have to say that..).

Our ability to offer input may be pretty limited - especially if the above is true and you really don't even have an office/lab in which to do these things. I'm not sure what university you are at, but it was pretty much a "given" everywhere I have been that these sorts of things are available. I'm not even sure what a graduate program would look like someplace that didn't have those things.
 
It sounds like your advisor said they should come to the university, right? So I'm assuming, like Ollie said, you have a dedicated space where you can meet them. If so, safety shouldn't really be an issue--or am I missing something? I'd say that's probably your best bet at this point, since it's so close to your deadline. Do you have any funding to give them a small token for compensation to motivate more people to contact you?
 
Wait - don't you have a laboratory or clinic space in which to conduct the interviews? And a work number? I certainly wouldn't recommend giving out your home number or personal email, but have no idea what kind of operation they are running. The above were assumed since I frankly, can't imagine anyone running an even semi-functional laboratory without at least a phone for participants to call. Maybe those resources are only provided to mentors who encourage students to pursue feasible studies at your university though;) I'm not sure what kind of studies other folks are running, but almost every study I have ever been involved in has entailed strangers calling/emailing the lab and then going there to participate. Save for purely online studies (which severely limits what can be done), I'm not sure what alternatives exist.

Skype has limits and I'm not sure of the security/ethics so that is something to check with your local IRB. There may or may not be ways to detect "faking" when posting an ad. Not exactly my field so I'm not sure what is standard is for that literature. I'm not sure what kind of money folks are being paid for the interviews, but if its fairly nominal that mitigates the risk of folks faking childhood cancer to some degree (how sad is it I have to say that..).

Our ability to offer input may be pretty limited - especially if the above is true and you really don't even have an office/lab in which to do these things. I'm not sure what university you are at, but it was pretty much a "given" everywhere I have been that these sorts of things are available. I'm not even sure what a graduate program would look like someplace that didn't have those things.

Adding to this, I've seen a lot of people create gmail account specific to a study for recruitment purposes... something like "childhoodcancerpainstudy@gmail . com"
 
I am nearing the end of finishing a qualitative study with a very specific population that was nearly impossible to recruit. What helped immensely was using Skype to access a larger region and allow participants to stay in their homes as well as snowballing. If you get a participant, ask them if they can think of anyone that might meet your criteria. If they like you and believe in your research topic, they will want to help you. Through snowballing, I met someone who runs therapy groups with my specific population and she was so excited to help me that she began recruiting for me. It was a miracle because I was running out of time and optimism.

Best of luck!
 
What helped immensely was using Skype to access a larger region and allow participants to stay in their homes as well as snowballing.
Did your IRB know you were using Skype? Data collection via Skype raises problems with lots of IRBs. There are HIPPA-compliant videoconferencing tools but all the ones I know of are pay-for-use.
 
Of course. Because of the nature of my study, I went through a full board review and we discussed using Skype. There was precedent for using it at my university and the participants were aware of its limitations.
 
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Wait - don't you have a laboratory or clinic space in which to conduct the interviews? And a work number?

No, I don't. Another girl in my course has the same supervisor and has been organising interviews at uni (with an easier topic), and she has told her to just organise a room through the psychology admin staff unfortunately. Thanks for your help.

Thanks to everyone else for your input too. I should be able to provide a small reward for their participation, and the email address just for my study is a great idea, thanks!

It seems that using Skype may be a bit of an ethical minefield, but I have submitted my ethics amendment, so it will be interesting to see what they come back with. Hopefully I will find some participants one way or another!

Thanks for all of your help!
 
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