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Participant Information Sheet for Online Respondents – Educational Studies staff, Educational studies postgraduate students and online respondents through the Centre for Arts and Learning public engagement
Finding Comfort within Discomfort:
Dr. Miranda Matthews, Educational Studies, m.matthews@gold.ac.uk:
Dear [Participant]
You are being invited to take part in a research project. Before you decide whether or not to take part, it is important for you to understand why the research is being done and what it will involve. Please take time to read the following information carefully.
With the unprecedented circumstances of Covid-19, academics, students and people in all walks of life have had to adjust to being within what might previously have seemed to be the ‘comfort zone’ of their own home, but through limitations on travel and social gathering has changed its significance for many. This research project proposes to explore how domestic and local space is explored in new or extended forms of creative self-expression that support wellbeing.
The arts are facing a time of great adjustment, in which the online interfaces for public engagement and learning opportunities could be more responsive to the experiences of change in localities and in everyday lives. This project intends to find out new ways in which creative learning communities can be built, and to make a new interactive interface between the research centre, staff, students and public audiences for the arts and learning.
Participants are asked to submit a film of 30-60 seconds, or an image and 150 words that gives an outward facing view of how they have creatively explored the discomfort zones of lockdown and social distancing. These submissions will become research data that can be thematically analysed, presented on online CAL forums and in research publications that explore creative responses to lockdown and social distancing in relation to Covid-19. Participation in the research is open to Masters, PhD and PGCE students and staff in Educational Studies, and to adult members of the public who engage with the Centre for Arts and Learning in its online forums. We would like to encourage a diversity of response including representation from BAME communities. The project will continue for the duration of social distancing regulations, or until July 2021, whichever is the longer time phase. Participants may also be asked to discuss their creative forms of self-expression and new learning ventures since March 2020 in interviews.
You have been invited to participate because we would like to hear about the ways you have adjusted your practice and lifestyles, or added new outlets that are comforting and supportive of wellbeing. The creative adjustments that you are making to the ways in which you work, learn and express yourselves through creative practice will help inform research into how the arts and learning are evolving as an adjustment to Covid-19 and experiences of social distancing from March 2020. We hope that participants will benefit from the project in being able to celebrate their resourceful
independent or collaborative creative self-expression, and to see this response to Covid-19 social distancing as a contribution to the learning experiences of others.
It is entirely up to you to decide whether or not to take part. If you decide to do so, you will be given this information sheet to keep and will be asked to give your informed consent on the accompanying consent form. You can withdraw from the project at any time without giving a reason. Neither refusal to participate nor withdrawal will have any impact on marks or future studies in the case of students, or on current or future employment conditions for staff.
If you take part you will be asked to create a short film of up to a minute and send this to us as an MP3 file and as a link to a private YouTube or Vimeo link that shows your creative adjustments to Covid-19 as you have found creative expression, new creative working or learning experiences. You can also send us 150 words and an accompanying image on the question ‘How have you creatively found comfort within discomfort?’ Spoken text on the video recording may be transcribed and you will be given the opportunity to review any transcripts. If you do decide to withdraw from the project, you will be asked what you want to happen to data you have provided up to that point, but please note that after July 2021 anonymised data can no longer be removed from the study.
All the information that we collect about you during the course of the research will be kept strictly confidential. You will not be able to be identified in any ensuing reports or publications. Film, image and text data will be stored in an anonymised form in the Goldsmiths Research Online data repository. Data from the whole project may be collected into anonymised datasets, in which no individual can be identified. Data that has consent for online presentation will be accessible internationally on The Centre for Arts and Learning online forums. The data collected during the course of the project might be used for additional or subsequent research. If you choose to send in film data in which you are identifiable you will be asked to indicate this on the accompanying consent form. Is this in the consent form?
Even with voices and faces disguised, identities are not truly anonymous on film and photographs that contain human subjects. If one or more human subjects are included in the film or images, they will need to have information sheets and consent forms also. Confidentiality will be respected subject to legal constraints and professional guidelines. Please note that assurances on confidentiality will be strictly adhered to unless evidence of wrongdoing or potential harm is uncovered. In such cases Goldsmiths may be obliged to contact relevant statutory bodies or agencies.
To continue your experiences of finding comfort within the new discomfort zones of social distancing, please only submit material that you have watched and read yourself and are happy with others seeing. A benefit of this project is for participants to be able to celebrate their resilience and creative ingenuity in making new creative learning experiences possible for themselves and others.
The results of the research might be used in a film presented on the CAL webpage and on Instagram. There could be a conference, seminar or symposium that connects with the research project. Results
Your experience of making arts practice could be therapeutic, however the research centre is not a counselling route. If you feel you need counselling about your experiences, options include self- referral to IAPT NHS Psychological Therapies Service; BPF Support is Key – for Key Workers, BME Health Forum, NHS BME Support and BAMEStream on Ubele.Org for Black and Minority Ethnic specific options, and Goldsmiths Wellbeing (wellbeing@gold.ac.uk) for staff and students at Goldsmiths. If you are working at a different workplace please also look into counselling options there, if you think this is necessary.
of the research are intended for publication. A copy of the film and published findings will be offered to each participant.
The Goldsmiths Educational Studies department is organising the research and it is approved by a (departmental ethics committee or by the Research Ethics and Integrity Sub-Committee, Goldsmiths, University of London).
If you have any concerns about your participation or about the project in general, you should first contact Dr. Miranda Matthews, m.matthews@gold.ac.uk If you feel your complaint has not been satisfactorily handled, you can contact the Chair of the Goldsmiths Research Ethics and Integrity Sub- Committee (via the committee secretary on (+44) (0)20 7717 3338 or reisc@gold.ac.uk).’
Thank you for reading this information sheet and for considering whether to take part in this research project. |
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