IRB: Your research isn't Research

Image from Southern Fried Science

I'm writing this post in part to procrastinate getting to my 3rd year review packet candidate statement (overwhelming!) and also to share some interesting facts I learned from meeting with IRB on campus to discuss restrictions of my study on effectiveness of digital badges in an IL course for student success.

There was a lot of confusion at first when filling out IRB because we were so low risk, and then had to deal with so many restrictions. Our IRB rep explained that historically, any research involving human subjects needed to come through them, and this was a ton of work for them to handle even if research studies proposed didn't really need to be under their jurisdiction. More recently, "Research" with a capital R has been defined by the federal government as being generalizable (some of this info might be here, though our rep said there isn't one definitive page or site explaining this yet for the general public). This is wholly different from research that is not meant to be generalizable, for example: program evaluations, quality improvement, case studies, etc.

It was funny because after providing the explanation, our rep wanted to backtrack and say that she wasn't implying we aren't doing "research," we just aren't doing "Research." We in fact are doing program evaluation research because we are measuring a specific program at the UA in order to improve the program and will be showing what was successful/problematic for us. We would not be saying our results clearly apply to all IL programs or credit courses across the country. However, if we did want to try to prove that somehow, we would need to stay under their jurisdiction (we have been approved as Exempt level 2 I believe). If we were to stay under IRB, we have to keep them updated on any changes to methods and the form of consent for students, as well as if we were to make any changes in obtaining data. We would also have a ton of restrictions in what we can and cannot access with student info.

Filling out what is the "309 form" here at the UA to essentially rescind our IRB application (I am thrilled to do this, but it's probably not a good idea for me to think about how much time I spent on this for my own sanity) will then move us to program evaluation and we can essentially do whatever we want so long as it's generally ethical and follows FERPA regulations.

With IRB, we would have had to only do an opt-in to our study for students, anonymize data to potentially miss out on seeing trends, and be cautious about asking certain questions in our survey. As program evaluation, we can really gather data any way we want.

My co-researcher made a good point that the basis for Research vs research is in the eye of the beholder (the reader). We won't be saying our research is generalizable, but obviously if someone is reading the article (if we are able to get published, of course), that means they are considering how they might apply our findings to their own program or credit course. It can be very nuanced.

So anyhow, I just wanted to share this. It sounds like it's getting a big push not just on our campus but all over. This conflicts with LIS anxiety over publishing Research, but program evaluation is not any less important. The only distinction is that it does not go through IRB.

SOPA on a ropa

I initially wrote this blog post on 1/21/12 during #alamw12 but didn't get a chance to post it. With the boycotting of Elsevier, I thought it would be a good time to pull this back out:

There has been a lot of talk about SOPA and PIPA leading up to the conference, and now during. One of my conference roommates, Lauren Bradley, pointed out this Tweet that is pretty hilarious:

http://twitter.com/#!/danwho/status/160800863298916353

Clearly, there is some inner turmoil in dealing with these vendors professionally, and having good relationships with them for our libraries and in general, yet if they are supporting something you (or I, I do) oppose such as SOPA, then what is our professional obligation versus personal ethics? This last Wednesday was a blackout day in solidarity of protest for SOPA. ALA made commentary via the website, and librarian projects such as Radical Reference and In the Library with the Lead Pipe went black for the day. I even blacked out Librarian Wardrobe.

Now that we’re physically at the conference, though (or, those of us who are here), what can we do to not have the cognitive dissonance of being so vocal on the internet battleground, but feeling politely silent at the conference? For starters, Andy Woodworth at Agnostic Maybe made an *amazing* color-coded guide to the exhibit hall. Amazing, really! So you know which vendors to complain to and/or avoid. I’d say this extends to the parties, too. I had RSVP’d to the Elsevier Dessert Reception but now decided I’m not going to go. Some of the ALA Think Tankers are going to go and protest while there. I guess it goes either way it’s kind of like if you don’t go and they see there are significantly fewer people there then maybe they’ll realize our collective voice is pretty strong. At the same time, if we don’t go to these things and actually verbalize our opposition, what will actually come of it? They could just think we aren’t showing up because of unrelated reasons. 

So what vendors have you spoken to, who support SOPA? What are you doing to fight against this crap? Do you think going to the party and protesting or not going by silent protest is more effective?

Kuhlthau, Second Life, and Beach Jupiter

All throughout library school I heard about Second Life, how exciting it was and how it could have educational benefits; I thought eh ok that's great for people who like that sort of stuff, and I'm willing to acknowledge its possible potential, but I wouldn't want to try it.

But the other day, I saw on the ili-l discussion list that the iSchool at Sheffield University was going to start a journal club in Second Life to talk about articles relating to information literacy instruction. After attending less interactive webinars more recently I thought maybe a visually-oriented, interactive web meeting would be more intriguing. I decided to just give Second Life a shot and thought I could attend the session while at our quieter, satellite campus.

To set myself up, I created an avatar and tried to get comfortable with the program (you need to download the browser to your computer (it's free)). Making my avatar look how I had sort of hoped was very awkward and seemed janky to me, but I feel like it's good enough -- she is no longer bald and wearing both a skirt and pants at the same time. Walking, running, and flying aren't as tedious as I had thought they would be, and for the most part, I think I get the basic functions.

The article we discussed in the session was:
Kuhlthau, C. C., Heinström, J. & Todd, R. J. (2008) "The 'information search process' revisited: Is the model still useful?." Information Research [ejournal], 13(4), paper 335. [Available at http://InformationR.net/ir/13-4/paper355.html]

Organized by "Sheila Yoshikawa" and with the discussion led by "Pancha Enzyme," which are Second Life handles of course, it was a smooth session with a lively discussion (my avatar's name is "Beach Jupiter"). It felt more interactive than a standard webinar, and granted it was meant to be a group discussion rather than a presentation, the visuals certainly made me feel more inclined to participate than an anonymous chatbox.

I'll summarize what I took away from the discussion, but won't spend too much time on summarizing the article itself since it's easy to access:

First, Pancha gave an overview of the article we read to reiterate the main points:

• it covers knowledge construction and feelings in information seeking
• the article showed it is still relevant today, changing for the information environment (technology)
• the method can be diagnostic in figuring out point-of-need to assist students struggling with assimilating information
• it offers recognition of discouraging and motivational emotions in the research process

 (And I will add, from the article, the six steps of the information search process are, in order:

1. initiation
2. selection
3. exploration
4. formulation
5. collection
6. presentation)

She also had slides ready that avatars could zoom in on to read closely and projected SCONUL's 7 Pillars of Information Literacy and Taylor's Learning Process Sequence (see section 3.1.3) for comparisons. We discussed that Taylor's process seems to offer more room for emotions (as opposed to SCONUL's pillars), and that it also focuses on the experience of learning.


We talked about strengths and weaknesses in the article as well:
Weaknesses first:

• article illustrates research process as linear, when it truly is not
• students could not describe their own emotions; they had to rate pre-chosen terms
• confidence intervals were small (for emotions)
• much information now comes from browsing and encountering (not just searching), so is the article still fully relevant today with the expanse of technology?
• individuals have different emotions when there is no grade involved (or money/time constraints for non-students)
• seems prescriptive: those who follow the process of this emotional rollercoaster during research will not be as successful, as it says the students who followed the process more closely did the best grade-wise and with learning

Strengths: 

• could be used as a marketing tool for libraries to appeal for more student/class time
• can use the process to show students that their frustrations and anxiety (as well as other negative emotions) are very common and do not represent a sign of failure
• could be used as a guide to time management
• (should be explicit for learners and not a secret guide for librarians/teachers)

They are looking for discussion leaders in future sessions, as well as articles to recommend. Seems like a great thing to keep up with, and I will be attending sessions as I am able.