More re Nas’ Question
From: Dr Tierney Lorenz
cc: Dr Nicole Prause
Thank you Demo!
In answer to Nas’ question: of course the community will be able to see the results of the research when it is completed. In fact, one of the things that we are dedicated to doing is releasing the (completely anonymized) data to a well-documented public database so that other scientists can benefit from this research and potentially come up with new ideas. However, because we are using the forum to recruit participants, it will be important that we not release results to the forum prematurely. We really want to make sure that folks are blinded to our hypotheses and to the directions we see the data taking, because it is a well-known phenomenon in research that as soon as the participant knows the way the experimenters are thinking about the data, they will behave in ways that are in line with those expectations. Unconsciously even, we all want to act in the way that is expected of us. But that would get in the way of having an objective study. We will do our best to keep you all updated on the sorts of things that would not violate that principle, such as how many people have started the study. But as for the results of the actual testing, I’m afraid that we will have to wait until all of the recruitment is completed. I should also take a moment to remind folks that this is a basic science etiology study – that means that we are looking at some possible predictors of the condition, but this is not a treatment study. We are not evaluating an intervention, although of course we hope that our data will help to make clear what kinds of interventions would be helpful (and give future research a leg up in validating possible interventions). We appreciate your understanding and patience- science is a very slow process- but it will move us forward!
Cheers
TKL
