To consider falsifying survey data?

[whitecremeegg]

I'm doing distance learning masters research. For my particular topic, participants for my research cannot be just anyone, it needs to be a particular very small 'group' of people - trying to be vague so as not to be outing.

I can't change my topic, it's work related and work are sponsoring me.

However, there are two 'gatekeeper' organisations with databases containing the details of these participants. I need access to these databases to get their contact details to survey them.

One of the gatekeepers is my current organisation, who despite sponsoring me, refuse to let me use the database. I have regular access to the database as an employee but not as a student.

The other organisation has also refused.

I'm not sure what the best option is now. I cannot change my topic or participant group. I can't go into more detail as to why without being outing. My org is sponsoring about 20 employees to do this course but I am the only one from my department so unlike the rest of the employees I can't change my topic as they have more variety in their roles than I do.

It is not a subject that is likely to cause harm - it's not the NHS, children, criminal subject or anything like that.

There are only 3 options that I can forsee:

1. Use the database anyway but lie as to how I got the participants (say it was social media or something)

1. Use social media but end up with little or even no participants. I am connected to some of the participants via my social media channels but this is only like 10 out of 300 that I'd like to survey. Participants could also NOT be from my target group

1. Falsify survey responses to make it look like I got lots of responses from social media - but again there's still the issue of social media not giving me the 'right' participants. How likely is it that universities can prove surveymonkey entries are fake?

What would you do in my position? I really would like to do things 'properly' but at this rate the research is going to be pretty crap.

I thought this course would be easy and that my organisation would be more helpful. but they are very much of the "we are paying your fees, you must do this particular topic, get on with it'.

Please don't flame me. I know it's an ethical issue but I'm genuinely stuck. I did speak to my supervisor (not about my falsifying idea) and she's been rather unhelpful. She says just to go down the social media route and keeps saying that she's not supposed to help me too much and similar to my employer, it's very much 'get on with it'.

Any help appreciated

What KosmoKramer said. Write in your dissertation that this is what you would have done had you been granted access to the participants, but you weren't, and do a review of the existing literature instead.

I think you probably also need to put it in writing to your organisation that they expect you to do this topic, yet have not allowed you to use the database. Get a relevant person to confirm this to you, in writing, and that they understand the impact it has on your research.

Whatever you do, do not falsify data, and do not make unethical use of the database.

I supervise MSc students, and really the dissertation exercise is about you learning how to conduct and carry out research. It is far less big of a deal to only have a few participants - but write up the intro, method, results and discussion well - than to falsify data. Add to the dishonesty the stress you would be putting yourself under doing this, always wondering whether you'd be caught. It's not worth it.

Can you share among your other networks, the criteria you are looking for to see if anyone has any ideas? For example, I am part of a natural health on line forum who frequently offer to help master students with their studies..

How does your organisation come into contact with the people you wish to survey, can you ask to leave leaflets in appointment rooms, ask secretaries to request participants to contact you... Can you sit down with your work sponsors and see if they have any ideas on how to get round this problem..

Are there any relevant forums you could post on? Mailing lists? Professional bodies? People do research projects like this all the time, you just need to contact people via all means you can think off (and include questions in your survey to identify respondents who aren't in your target group).

Your organisation may not be allowed to let you use the database. However they would certainly be allowed to contact the respondents themselves and ask if they would be willing to take part in your research. Is there no way you could get them agree to this? Potentially it could even be you contacting the respondents in your work capacity, asking if they would consent to being contacted separately for the research project. However I wouldn't do that without your organisation's agreement.

Really hard.

Working out whether data is genuine or not has very little to do with IP addresses and a lot to do with patterns, how consistent (or over-consistent) it is.
Surely the colleagues you have on social media have links to other colleagues?
Bottom line: small sample size won't fail you. Cheating will.

Are there any Facebook groups for members of your target group? E.g. there are groups around professions, nationalities, medical conditions, hobbies. You could apply to join to share your survey.

Or any relevant websites who might disseminate your survey?

Will your 10 contacts know other relevant people and be able to pass your survey along?

Are there any events where these people meet that you could attend?

Would your organization send your survey invitation to the target group themselves, without sharing the addresses with you?

Definitely don't falsify data, too risky.

But if you are drawing a blank and will have minimal responses, I'd want it in writing from your employer that they are aware of this and still won't grant access.

Ask your 10 contacts to share the link to your survey on their social media, advertise on any relevant forum you can think of, just don't fake the survey. You'll probably end up with a pattern of randomness that will never give you the right insights.

Social media but pay for it - a limited spend of say £20-50 will really boost your reach on Facebook and you can target it pretty carefully too.

With GDPR on the horizon, depending on how their databases have been permissioned i’m not sure that they can let you use the database (directly or indirectly) to send an email asking them to do something, unless people have been specifically asked if they are open to hearing about research projects they could participate in.

You could see if they have a newsletter which you can put a note in? And with social media YOU have 10 people on your list, contact them personally and ask them not only to take part but to forward it on. Join industry groups on LinkedIn and post the link to your research, including a request to people to forward it on. Find out if there are any professional groups in your industry on Twitter and tweet them the link and ask them to retweet it to their followers.

If your first instinct to a set back is to give up and cheat, maybe research is not for you?

No, never falsify data!

Ask the people you do know if they know any one they can send the survey to. Or any facebook groups or forums.

Search for forums on likely relevant topics.

If its e.g. a health issue, contact some specialist and ask if they can pass on the survey details. If its e.g. music go to some music shops and teachers. You get the idea.

Can you only use national respondents? Search for forums and groups abroad.

Is there an advisory(?) body like the national autistic society that you could advertise the survey through.

Absolutely do not use the databases without permission - the law is about to change so that you would risk huge fines for you and your employer and if the participant group is that specific you may well be.

Social media is the way forwards - you need to brainstorm ways to make it work for you. Start with the ten people you have and see if they are connected to any other people in the same group, and keep on it.

Hell, try Mumsnet - even if it's not the same demographic that tends to use the site we all know people, you could put in a link to a tweet or FB post and ask people to share it in their own networks.

If you have a specific demographic to target, try paying for FB advertising.

Get it on Reddit in a relevant subgroup, too.

You go option two and it gives you loads to discuss the lack of access to information. Research isn't just about making breakthrough findings! Never ever falsify data or illegally access it. You may find you get better responses anyway, but if not that opens up loads of discussion, which is great for your dissertation.

Universities don't really care from what i remember if you don't get a good number of participants as long as you detail why not and what you would expect with more of them.

You don't deserve the masters if you falsify the data to be honest. The rest of us actually worked for it, we didn't lie about it. All you're doing is providing 'evidence' to support your theory and its incorrect evidence if you falsify. A big example for you in this was the man who claimed the mmr vaccine cause autism. Any one in research takes a very dim view on false evidence and you'd deserve to be caught. Please don't do it. I don't care what the topic is, you're wrong to even want to do it. Find another way.

Also, go and see your university librarian, or email them, and ask for help finding resources on boosting questionnaire responses. They won't be able to tell you exactly how to do it, but they will be able to hook you up to journals, etc., things like Sage Research Methods if they have a sub, and that will give you two things: ideas, and references to discuss and include in your lit review/methodology.

Really make sure your lit review is sparkling, so that it can mitigate a potential loss of marks from weak conclusions from limited data. And discuss with your tutor what else you can do to address the potential weakness of not getting enough data. Can you add in further secondary sources from somewhere? Find articles that examined the same topic as what you're doing and look at their data too?

Check with the library what databases they have too - if you're after business contacts, for instance, many uni libraries will have something that covers it.

I wouldn’t worry about the lack of responses. Someone I recently did my MSc with was adamant that they were going to get loads of data and in the end only were able to speak to three people. They just then tweaked their paper to be more of a case study and asked them a few more in-depth questions. At the end of the day you just need to pass, no need to falsify the data. 10k words really is nothing and by the time you write up everything if you can speak to only a few people but get a little more info you will be fine.

Lots of good suggestions here thank you, I think I might try social media initially and hope for snowball sampling from the connections I have.

Unfortunately paid services won't get the participants I need, nor is MN likely too but thanks for offering.

I really don't want to be specific in case anyone from my organisation is on here but vaguely I wish to survey providers of a particular service, contracted to do so by my governmental department, in a particular part of the UK to a particular group of young people.

Please tell us you aren't going to falsify data though as I'm still worried you're going to.

Could you not draft a letter/contact details to the general group and ask your HR person to send it to the people on the database? Then they can contact you voluntarily, and you haven’t accessed the data base.

Hmm, that is tricky.

Have you got access to past dissertations at your uni? If so, you can probably only see the higher scoring ones. Have a flick through them, even if they're not on your topic, and see how they handled lack of participants for ideas.

If your department is governmental your results are likely to make impact on people's lives.

Also, if sampling is known to be difficult, you presenting 200 complete surveys is bound to rise eyebrows.

Falsifying data in a government position?! I honestly cant comprehend when you would even suggest it.

If your employer had enough potential.participants could you send a work wide email saying 'if you have a pet money please answer my survey, it will assist the company in these ways:'

Obviously those without pet monkeys can just ignore, but you want get a good response, especially if also linked with prize draw as another poster said

HolidayHelpPlease I am hoping to make a suggestion like that to the decision making person in my organisation, perhaps something in a newsletter etc rather than using the database.

I don't want to falsify data, but I'm not ruling it out yet. I will try everything I can to get responses and see what happens.

It's a 15,000 - 17,000 word dissertation with a strict structure of introduction, literature review, methodology, results, discussion, conclusion. I cannot do literature review alone.

Falsifying data is just bonkers and will be more than obvious!