Do you debrief?

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I debriefed my participants today. I am not sure if they want to be debriefed but I thought it would make participants feel more part-of-Prolific, more likely to pay attention, because and I would want to know.

I am almost never debriefed when I participate as a participant.

I have already received word from two participants (I asked if it were spam or interesting) to say that they were interested, and grateful and wishing me luck with my research. They also mentioned that they are rarely debriefed.

Perhaps Prolific could think of a way of encouraging debriefing, to foster camaraderie and attention among the subject pool e.g. by taking longer to move to completed if there was no debriefing message (but folks could just send a message containing “thanks”).

I am going to debrief more in future.

Tim

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When I was in college, I had to participate in research for my Intro Psych class. They said it’s an educational experience, but we all knew it was really to get subjects. I felt like, to the extent that it’s educational, debriefing is important. I liked understanding what the study was about, and knowing who to contact if I wanted to find out more. Since then, I almost always debrief.

Also, if a study has any kind of deception, ethics boards almost always require debriefing to tell the truth as soon as possible.

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