You are invited to participate in a research study conducted by Tal Yarkoni (a PhD student) and Professor Simine Vazire from Washington University in St. Louis. This project has been reviewed and approved by the Washington University Human Research Protection Office (HRPO). The main purpose of this research is to investigate the relation between people’s personalities and the content and style of their writing. You will fill out a personality questionnaire and will be asked to provide information about your blog if you have one. (If you do not have a blog, you are still welcome to participate, and will receive the same results.) At the end of the experiment, you will be provided with some information about your personality scores.
We will do our best to protect your privacy and your rights as a research participant. The questionnaires you will fill out are completely anonymous, and we will not collect or retain any personally identifying information about you, with the possible exception of your blog’s address, should you choose to share it with us. The data we collect will not be shared with anyone except the research team unless it has been de-identified according to federal research guidelines by removing any information that could potentially be used to identify you. Moreover, you may skip any question that you do not wish to answer for any reason.
In rare instances, a researcher's study may undergo an audit or program evaluation by Washington University or an external oversight agency (such as the Office for Human Research Protection). This may result in disclosure of your data as well as other information collected by the researcher. If this were to occur, such information would only be used to determine whether the researcher conducted this study properly and adequately protected your rights as a human participant. There would be no personally identifying information linking you to your data. Importantly, any and all audits would maintain confidentiality of any information reviewed by their office(s).
Your participation is entirely voluntary. You may choose not to participate in this research study or to withdraw your consent at any time by navigating away from this website or closing your browser. You may skip any question that you do not wish to answer. There are no known risks associated with participating in this experiment except for the potential for boredom or fatigue. However, upon completion of the study, you will be given the option of seeing your personality scores. Should you choose to view your scores, please note that there is a small risk that some of the feedback you receive will be unpleasant. There are no known benefits except for the knowledge that your participation is contributing to science.
To protect your privacy, we recommend that you close your browser after completing the experiment.
If you have questions, concerns, or complaints about this study, please contact the Project Director (Tal Yarkoni, 1-314-935-6475, tyarkoni@wustl.edu) or the Faculty Advisor (Dr. Simine Vazire, 1-314-935-5215, svazire@wustl.edu).
If you wish to talk to someone else, or have questions or concerns about your rights as a research subject, call Dr. Philip Ludbrook, Executive Chair of the University's Human Research Protection Office, at (3l4) 633-7400 or (800) 438-0445.
By clicking on the button below, you indicate that you have read the above information and consent to participate in our study.