Does your workplace use technology to infer how you feel while at work? We are recruiting adults 18+ with current or recent (within 1 year) experience at US-located workplaces that use technology to record, measure, analyze, or respond to the things they say, things they write, or how they look, to infer how they feel while at work. Eligible adults will be invited to participate in a 90-minute remote interview session. Selected participants that complete the interview will receive a $35 gift card. If interested in participating in this interview study, fill out a short 2-minute survey so that the research team may contact you if you are eligible and selected to participate. https://umich.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_a4qafXZNSyz69Se
Additional information about this study can be found below:
WORKER EXPERIENCES WITH TECHNOLOGIES THAT INFER THEIR FEELINGS IN THE WORKPLACE
HUM # 00195861
Principal Investigator:
Kat Roemmich, PhD student, University of Michigan School of Information
Faculty Advisors:
Nazanin Andalibi, Assistant Professor, University of Michigan School of Information
Florian Schaub, Assistant Professor, University of Michigan School of Information
You are invited to participate in an interview study about peoples’ experiences with technologies that infer the feelings of employees in their workplace. To participate, you must:
• currently work or recently have worked (within the past year) in a workplace that digitally records, measures, or analyzes the things you say, the things you write, how you look, or how you feel
• uses this technology to make inferences about and/or respond to what you think or what you feel. During the online study, a trained researcher will interview you about your experiences with these technologies at work. If you agree to be part of the research study, you will be asked to participate in an up to 90-minute video interview conducted remotely over Zoom, at a time that is convenient for you. There are no direct tangible benefits to participating in this study. However, your participation will help us understand the impact of technologies that infer the feelings of employees in the workplace. These new technologies are emerging in workplace environments, yet their social effects in this context are largely unknown. The perspectives of workers that have experience with these technologies are important to understanding their impact to the workplace. Because this study collects information about you, one of the risks of this research is a loss of confidentiality (disclosure of this information outside of the research). In this event, you could be presented with a risk to your relationship with your employer. To minimize risk to you, we will take special precautions to protect your privacy, your confidentiality, and the confidentiality of your research records:
• We will minimize the information we collect about you. Any information that could directly or indirectly identify you will be password protected, encrypted, and securely stored in a separate location from the research information we collected from you.
• We will de-identify research records, meaning that the research information collected during the interview will be maintained in a way that prevents its association with a specific person. Before storing and analyzing research data, we will remove any information that could identify you or your place of employment. Interview data will be assigned a code which will be stored separately from your personal information. Data that could be used to link you to this code, including video and audio recordings, will be destroyed at the conclusion of the study. De-identified transcripts will be retained and securely stored.
• We will restrict access to the research data. Only authorized study team members will have access to information collected for this study. A summary of the study’s results will be made available to you upon request. You will receive $35 via gift card for your participation in the study. If you withdraw from the study before the end of the interview, we will prorate payment according to the time spent interviewing until withdrawal. Participating in this study is completely voluntary. Even if you decide to participate now, you may change your mind and stop at any time. You may choose not to continue with the interview for any reason. You do not have to answer any questions you do not want to answer. You may pause or end the interview at any time without penalty. If you proceed with the interview and later wish to withdraw, you can contact us. Once the study is concluded we will destroy any linkage between your personal information and the research data, at which point withdrawal would no longer be possible. We plan to publish the results of this study. To protect your privacy, we will not include any information that could identify you in any way in reports or publications resulting from this study. If you have questions about this research study, please contact us:
Kat Roemmich, PI and PhD student at [email protected]
Nazanin Andalibi, faculty advisor at [email protected]
Florian Schaub, faculty advisor at [email protected]
As part of their review, the University of Michigan Institutional Review Board Health Sciences and Behavioral Sciences has determined that this study is no more than minimal risk and exempt from on-going IRB oversight.
