Data collection in LMICs can carry harmful consequences for the involved research staff, including threats to their physical and emotional well-being, intricate role conflicts, precarious employment conditions, inadequate remuneration, intellectual exploitation and feelings of guilt and shame. There is to date little evidence on the challenges faced by research staff, particularly on lower hierarchical levels, including local data collectors, translators, and local field managers.
Our interdisciplinary team of researchers aims to shed light on an aspect of ethics in development research by launching a large-scale online survey in six languages (Bengali, English, French, Hindi, Portuguese, Spanish, Swahili) to learn more about the perspective of those involved in research activities in low- and middle-income countries.
Have you been engaged in any data collection activities in low- and middle-income countries in the past six years (e.g., as data collector, enumerator, PhD, Postdoc, PI or similar positions)? If yes, we would be very grateful if you could participate in our survey (which is fully anonymous) and share your experiences with us. Answering the survey questions will take 15-20 minutes:
The study is led by Dr. Jana Kuhnt (German Development Institute), Dr. Ana Garcia-Hernandez (University of Rosario and Innovations for Poverty Action, Colombia), Dr. Janina Steinert (Technical University of Munich, Germany) and Lennart Kaplan, Postdoctoral Researcher at the University of Göttingen. More information on the research project can be found here: https://sites.google.com/view/ethicsindevelopmentresearch/home.
Ultimately, we hope that findings from this online survey can contribute to the wellbeing and safety of all research staff. Please help us spread the survey: Based on our joint reflections of ethical challenges on data collection in the global South, there might be many colleagues who could contribute their perspective. We would be very grateful if you could forward the survey to them (using the same link). Please do not hesitate to contact the team with any questions you may have by writing to research-ethics-survey@uni-goettingen.de
