UK Voices: Information Sheet

The National Centre for Social Research (NatCen), in partnership with the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), is carrying out interviews about the lives and experiences of people in the UK, including the topics of most importance to them, and changes over time. This research is a pilot project funded by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI). This page provides information on taking part in our research.

About the study

This important pilot study aims to help develop a new approach to collecting and using in-depth interview data. Its purpose is to test whether and how open-ended interviews can be conducted in large numbers and provide data that can be used by researchers to explore a wide variety of topics.

What is the research?

To understand what works well and less well about our proposed approach, we are carrying out interviews with a representative sample of people from around the UK who have previously taken part in the NatCen Panel. Taking part in the research will help us to understand whether and how data like this could be collected at scale, to build a detailed and representative picture of the lives of people in the UK and support future research on a wide range of topics.

Why are you contacting me?

We have drawn a representative sample of the UK population from the NatCen Panel for this research. As a member of the Panel who previously gave NatCen permission to contact you about opportunities to take part in our qualitative research, you have been selected and we’d like to invite you to take part in a one-one interview with a member of the NatCen research team.

The range and diversity of people taking part in this research is really important. Our sample has been carefully drawn to ensure it can be as representative as possible of the UK population. If we can achieve this, we’ll ensure that the data we collect in the interviews builds a rounded understanding of people’s views and experiences across the population, which will help make the resource we hope to develop as useful as possible for future research.

What would taking part involve?

Research interview

We’re inviting you to take part in a one-to-one interview with a member of the NatCen research team. This would take place at a date and time that is convenient for you in March or April. The interview can take place online or in person, according to your preference, and will last no longer than 90 minutes.

To get to know about the issues and experiences that matter to you, the kinds of things we’d like to ask you about are:

• How you would describe your life story.
• What a typical day looks like for you.
• Your local area.
• A bit about your health and wellbeing.
• Your thoughts about the future.

If you would like to, you can also bring an object or picture that is important to you to discuss in the interview.

Interviews will be audio recorded and transcribed to provide an accurate record of what you say. The audio recordings will be stored securely and deleted at the end of the project. Transcripts will be anonymised (by removing identifying information such as names of individuals or places) so that you will not be recognisable.

Everybody who takes part will receive a £40 Love2Shop voucher as thanks for their time and contribution to this research.

Archiving data

We will be archiving data from this research in the UK Data Archive to make them available for future researchers. This will include:

• Your interview transcript (with any names or other identifiable details excluded).
• Some data about you – including your demographic characteristics and some of the answers you have previously provided to the NatCen Panel. This is so that researchers accessing the archived information in future will understand the range of people who have taken part.

Your name and other identifiable details will not be included in the archived version of the data.

Unfortunately, it is not possible for us to include anyone in the research who would not be happy for their data to be archived in this way.

Do I have to take part? 

No – it’s entirely up to you. If you do take part in an interview, you can choose what to focus on and how much or little you want to say. You are free to skip any questions you’d prefer not to answer and can take a break or end the discussion at any time.

If you change your mind about being involved, you can contact us beforehand or let us know on the day. You can also change your mind and withdraw from the research at any point up to two weeks after the interview, by contacting the research team to let us know.

Will anyone else find out what I have told you?

We will treat everything you say as confidential and anonymous. This means that only we will know exactly what has been discussed and by whom: you will not be identified to anyone outside of the research team. All identifiable details will be removed before your data is archived.

The only exception to confidentiality would be if you were to disclose an identifiable crime or tell us something that gave us reason to believe you or someone else might be at risk of serious harm. If this were to happen, we might need to pass your information on to an authority, which could include the police.

Because of the relatively small number of people taking part in the research, it is possible that someone reading outputs from this research, or accessing the archived data in future, may recognise your voice in any quotes from your interview or in the archived version of your transcript. To minimise this risk, the researcher will check with you at the end of the interview whether you are comfortable with everything you have shared being included in our research outputs and the archive.

What happens to the data collected for this project?

The interviews we carry out will be used to inform a report of our findings to our funder (UKRI) and our International Advisory Board, made up of a small number of academic researchers from universities around the world. Our report will focus on assessing the research approach, and whether open-ended interviews like these are effective in gathering data that is useful for research on a number of topics. We will also set out considerations for future studies of this type. Our findings may also be published in, for example, academic articles, reports, blogs, policy briefings or summary documents.

No identifying information will be included in any of our research outputs: when we write up and talk about the research, we will take steps to maintain participants’ anonymity. We will not attribute views or quotations to named individuals, and we will not include names of people or places that may be mentioned.

Your data will also be pseudonymised and archived in the UK Data Archive, where it will be accessible to researchers in the future. Researchers using the archived data will not have access to identifiable details about you, such as your name or location. They may publish findings based on their analysis of the data in the future.

Further details about how your data will be stored, used and deleted are set out in the privacy notice.

What happens next?

If you would like to take part in the research, or have any questions before you decide, please get in touch:

Email: ukvoices@natcen.ac.uk 
Freephone: 0808 178 0074

Thank you for your help!