A Research Study About The Development Of College Students

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CONSENT FORM
You are invited to take part in a research study about the development of youth who have experienced
a prior loss of a parent and have left home to go to college. The researcher is inviting college students 18
years to 21 years of age to be in the study. This form is part of a process called “informed consent” to
allow you to understand this study before deciding whether to take part.
This study is being conducted by a researcher named Carla Elbel, who is a doctoral student at Walden
University.
Background Information:
The purpose of this study is to add to the understanding of how individuals process the prior parental
loss when they leave home and attend college, and how their psychosocial development compares to
students who have not lost a parent before they leave home and attend college.
Procedures:
This study involves the following steps:
You will be asked to complete online surveys about your bereavement experiences, commitment to
personally meaningful values and goals, interpersonal commitments, and intimacy. It will take
approximately 1 hour to complete the surveys

Here are some sample questions:
1. After I left for college, I found it hard to get along with certain people.
Mark only one:
Completely True
Mostly True
Both True and
False
Mostly False
False
2. I found it hard to play at school well after I left for college.
Mark only one:
Completely True
Mostly True
Both True and
False
Mostly False
False
Voluntary Nature of the Study:
Research should only be done with those who freely volunteer. So, everyone involved will respect
your decision to join or not. If you decide to join the study now, you can still change your mind later.
You may stop during the online surveys at any time. The researcher seeks 106 volunteers for this
study. 53 participants who have not lost a parent before attending college and 53 who have lost a
parent before attending college.

Risks and Benefits of Being in the Study:
Being in this study could involve some risk of the minor discomforts that can be encountered in daily
life, such as being reminded of a loss in your life, which may result in feelings of sadness. With the
protections in place, this study would pose minimal risk to your wellbeing. The National Alliance for
Grieving Children https://childrengrieve.org is available in case you have an overwhelming amount of
grief feelings brought about by completing the forms.
This study offers no direct benefits to individual volunteers. The aim of this study is to benefit society
by finding ways to help those that experience a parental loss.
Payment:
No compensation is provided for participating in this study.
Privacy:
The researcher is required to protect your privacy. Your identity will be kept anonymous, within the
limits of the law. The researcher will not ask for your name at any time or link responses to your
contact information. The researcher will not use your personal information for any purposes outside of
this research project. Also, the researcher will not include your name or anything else that could
identify you in the study reports. If the researcher were to share this dataset with another researcher in
the future, the researcher is required to remove all names and identifying details before sharing; this
would not involve another round of obtaining informed consent. Data will be kept secure by passwordprotected files. Back-ups of the data will also be stored in a password-protected flash drive, which will
also be kept in a locked filing cabinet in the researcher’s office. Only the results will be given in the
published report.

Data will be kept for a period of at least 5 years, as required by the university.
Contacts and Questions:
You can ask questions of the researcher by email- carla.elbel@waldenu.edu. If you want to talk
privately about your rights as a participant or any negative parts of the study, you can call Walden
University’s Research Participant Advocate at 612-312-1210. Walden University’s approval number
for this study is 03-15-21-0421817 and it expires on March 14, 2022.
You might wish to retain this consent form for your records. You may ask the researcher or Walden
University for a copy at any time using the contact info above.
Obtaining Your Consent
If you feel you understand the study and wish to volunteer, please indicate your consent by returning a
completed survey online at 

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/F39DQH6

Compensation: no compensation

Location: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/F39DQH6