An investigation of attitudes towards mental health conditions

Participant Information

Invitation You are being invited to take part in a research study. Before you decide 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.

What is the purpose of this study? The purpose of this study is to explore attitudes towards mental health conditions, namely Schizophrenia, Depression and Generalised Anxiety Disorder.

Do I have to take part? No, it is up to you to decide whether or not to take part. If you do decide to take part, you will be asked to provide consent online. If you do decide to take part, you are still free to withdraw at any time and without giving a reason. You must be aged 18 years and over to participate.

Will my taking part in this study be kept confidential? Yes, no personally identifying information will be gathered during the survey and as such your taking part in this study will be entirely confidential. Because we won’t be able to identify your answers, there is no chance of retracting your data once you click the last submit button (there will be five submit buttons total, with a warning on the final page). If you wish to withdraw from the study, you must discontinue before completing the study.

What will participation involve? You will first be asked about your age and gender identity. You will then be asked to read three narrative descriptions about people who have been diagnosed with a mental health disorder (Schizophrenia, Depression and Generalised Anxiety Disorder. After each description, you will be asked to rate how you feel about them in a series of questions. Lastly, you will be asked to fill out a disgust sensitivity scale (the concepts relate to pathogen, moral and sexual disgust). We anticipate that participation will last approximately 20 minutes.

We hope that you will find taking part in our research to be a worthwhile activity. We consider your views and experiences as extremely valuable to us.

What are the possible disadvantages and risks of taking part in the study? There are no anticipated disadvantages in taking part. However, if you feel that you may be unduly affected by either the items related to mental health, or the items related to pathogen, moral or sexual disgust, please discontinue your participation.

What will happen to the results of the research study? Your data is entirely anonymous and unidentifiable and will be gathered using GDPR compliant software and stored on a secure server. Data, without any personal identifying information, may be made publicly available in an online database for re-analysis by other researchers. Anonymous results of this study will be presented in student research reports and may also be presented at conferences or published in journals, books, and the popular media. If you would like a summary of the results, this can be made available to you upon request from the researchers.

All data and results will be anonymous, kept confidential, and securely stored at all times. All data collected will be kept on a password protected computer with an encrypted hard drive for the duration of the project. This research is being conducted as part of an undergraduate research project. This research is conducted in accordance with the British Psychological Society's Code of Ethics and Conduct.

Who can I contact if I want more information? If you would like more information on the study, please contact the student researchers:

Ellie Murphy 2677412m@student.gla.ac.uk; Amy McGregor 2566333m@student.gla.ac.uk

Or their project supervisors:

Dr Eugene Dawydiak - Eugene.Dawydiak@glasgow.ac.uk Dr Jude Stevenson - Judith.Stevenson@glasgow.ac.uk

Please click the button below to begin the study

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