In case study two, investigators analyzed the relationship between trauma in childhood and the effect on interpersonal relationships as an adult. Thirty incarcerated participants from the Midwest were randomly chosen. They were given the option to decline to participate in the study. Those who did choose to participate signed a consent form. A questionnaire was given to obtain personal demographics, trauma and interpersonal relationship behaviors. The questionnaire was administered in face to face interviews.
The benefits to this research study are quite limited. The benefits to the researcher may give some correlation between childhood trauma and adult relationship patterns. Another benefit to the researcher may be that during a face to face interview, the participant may provide subjective data or personal feelings that may help the researcher understand the issues on a more personal level. The potential benefit for the participant would be to express feelings, feel less burdened, and feel as though they are being heard. Prisoners very rarely get adequate access to mental health treatment, (The Marshall Project, 2018). The benefit to society could potentially be treating children and adults that have experienced childhood trauma with different treatments to promote healthy interpersonal relationships as adults.
The risks to this study are very substantial. The information that researchers gain from this study is mostly subjective. In addition, the sampling size is thirty people, which is relatively small when researching data with this much information over many years. Also, the sampling size, while “random” is only incarcerated participants from one area of the country. The risks are abundant including threats to privacy and psychological risks. When conducting a face to face interview about sensitive subject matters the risk is more than minimal. The risks to the participant would be primarily from discussing the sensitive material during an interview, possibly without any follow-up on their mental health. The risks to the researcher would be potential violence depending on how the interviews were arranged with security. People with types of mental illness could be interviewed and there may not be a way to predict how safe an interview may be. The risk for society is setting criteria and implementing changes is treatment based on such a weak study. Another risk is altering the data collection and storage. This is subject to how judgmental the researcher is that would be conducting the interviews. It is a potential risk to have biases of the interviewer transcend onto the data collection and research.
The level of Institutional Review Board approval needed would be a full board review. According to John Carroll University, a full board review is needed when topics for investigation include prisoners, illegal activities, substance abuse, sexual orientation, criminal history, etc. All these issues could potentially be researched in the case study. According to the National Bioethics Advisory Commission, any research involving more than a minimal risk, requires a full IRB review, and the protections for participants becomes stricter, for example, more than just a signed consent (The National Bioethics Advisory Commission, 2016).
References:
Chapter 4: Assessing Risks and Potential Benefits and Evaluating Vulnerability (Research Involving Human Participants V1). (2016, February 1). Retrieved from https://www.onlineethics.org/cms/8033.aspx#risks
Moon, M. (2009, April 01). The History and Role of Institutional Review Boards: A Useful Tension. Retrieved January 31, 2020, from https://journalofethics.ama-assn.org/article/history-and-role-institutional-review-boards-useful-tension/2009-04
STEP ONE: Before You Begin: INVESTIGATORS’ GUIDE. (2019). Retrieved January 31, 2020, from https://jcu.edu/research/irb/investigators-guide/step-one-you-begin
Thompson, C. (2018, November 21). Why So Few Federal Prisoners Get The Mental Health Care They Need. Retrieved January 31, 2020, from https://www.themarshallproject.org/2018/11/21/treatment-denied-the-mental-health-crisis-in-federal-prisons
I, too found it interesting that the interview was administered face-to-face. Until reading your response, I didn’t think of the potential benefit of the prisoner feeling “heard” regarding trauma from childhood. Like you mentioned, prisoners often do not get access to mental health treatment. Perhaps this interview is the first time they are able to confide in someone rather than keeping their trauma bottled up inside. Many of the other posts on Case Study 2 have mentioned the fact that the questionnaire could bring up childhood trauma that could upset the prisoner. I like how you have a different take on this.
Do you think the researchers chose a prison due to easy access to subjects all in one place, or could it possibly be due to the fact that prisons tend to house a higher population of people that have experienced trauma? According to research, incarcerated persons have more traumatic childhood experiences than the general population. Trauma symptoms and adverse childhood experiences are elevated in these populations, but there is not enough research to determine how the traumatic experience and being imprisoned are related (Evans, 2018). This can result in the inability to develop treatments for this population, since data related to this specific population is limited. It would be interesting to have more background information on Case Study 2 to determine the reason for the researchers picking the prison population and their reasons for doing so. Did they pick the prison for ease of use, or do they recognize that this population does not receive enough study and treatments for their past childhood traumas?
Evans, W. (2018, August). Trauma before Incarceration: examining the role of adverse childhood experiences. Retrieved February 6, 2020, from https://traumapsychnews.com/2018/07/trauma-before-incarceration-examining-the-role-of-adverse-childhood-experiences/
Great post! I also did not put two and two together until reading your post. Face to face interviews would be more beneficial to the participant to be heard and really let out the event. Traumatic childhood events are higher in the incarcerated population. Childhood trauma is associated with the risk for emotional disorders such as anxiety and depression and co-morbidity conditions such as alcohol and drug abuse and antisocial behaviors in adulthood. One of the biggest traumas in childhood male prisoners were reports was abondement. Rejection by family members and friends related to the incarceration in combination with the social isolation and material deprivation associated with prison may feel like abandonment to incarcerated people and may trigger memories and emotional feelings associated with childhood experiences of abandonment. Some of the responses that need to be looked out for are anger, aggression towards others, and self-destructive and suicidal behaviors.
I do wonder if they picked a prison, because the easy access to participants or if they study was based on the high statistics of childhood trauma linked to incarcerated individuals.
Wolff, N., & Shi, J. (2012, May). Childhood and adult trauma experiences of incarcerated persons and their relationship to adult behavioral health problems and treatment. Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3386595/
I agree with both of you concerning the lack of information on the population sample. There is a high prevalence of childhood trauma among the prison population, but I still feel that the population sample could still be misleading when discussing childhood trauma in general. There is also high prevalence of mental disorders among the prison population (Journal of Psychiatric Research, 2010). Who is to say if the trauma and mental illness caused them to be in prison or if they are just more prone to illegal activity? I still think that the research is skewed if it is meant to reflect the general population.
Mandelli, L., Carli, V., Serretti, A., Roy, A., & Sarchiapone, M. (2010, October 26). Journal of Psychiatric Research. Retrieved February 09, 2020, from https://s3.amazonaws.com/academia.edu.documents/51389712/j.jpsychires.2010.11.00520170117-5462-1uqkrzh.pdf?response-content-disposition=inline%3B%20filename%3DThe_influence_of_childhood_trauma_on_the.pdf&X-Amz-Algorithm=AWS4-HMAC-SHA256&X-Amz-Credential=AKIAIWOWYYGZ2Y53UL3A%2F20200210%2Fus-east-1%2Fs3%2Faws4_request&X-Amz-Date=20200210T012709Z&X-Amz-Expires=3600&X-Amz-SignedHeaders=host&X-Amz-Signature=391a496ba9dc7d1aed77f14ce37df572790abd6ee1589ed938c33be6d2833ac5