Perspectives on Recruitment and Representativeness in Forensic Psychiatric Research

Participant representativeness and statistical power are crucial elements of robust research with human participants, both of which relate to the successful recruitment of research participants. Nevertheless, such core features may often not be fully reported or duly considered in psychiatric resear...

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Published inFrontiers in psychiatry Vol. 12; p. 647450
Main Authors Pedersen, Sven H., Bergman, Henrik, Berlin, Johan, Hartvigsson, Thomas
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Frontiers Media S.A 17.06.2021
Subjects
care
Clinical Medicine
forensic psychiatry
informed-consent
inpatients
interpretability
Klinisk medicin
length-of-stay
Medical and Health Sciences
Medicin och hälsovetenskap
mental-health
participants
Psychiatry
Psykiatri
representativeness
research ethics
research participation
transparency
update
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Summary:Participant representativeness and statistical power are crucial elements of robust research with human participants, both of which relate to the successful recruitment of research participants. Nevertheless, such core features may often not be fully reported or duly considered in psychiatric research. Building on our experiences of collecting data in the context of forensic mental health services, we discuss issues regarding participant recruitment and representativeness in our field with its particular characteristics. A quick sampling and brief overview of the literature in four specialized forensic mental health journals is presented, demonstrating that published manuscripts rarely describe the data in sufficient detail for the reader to assess sample representativeness and statistical power. This lack of transparency leads not only to difficulties in interpreting the research; it also entails risks relating to the already meager evidence base of forensic mental health services being relevant only to a subset of patients. Accordingly, we provide suggestions for increased transparency in reporting and improved recruitment of research participants. We also discuss the balance of ethical considerations pertinent to the pursuit of increased participation rates in forensic mental health research.
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Reviewed by: Birgit Angela Völlm, University of Rostock, Germany; Deniz Cerci, Universitätsklinikum Rostock, Germany
Edited by: Pietro Pietrini, IMT School for Advanced Studies Lucca, Italy
This article was submitted to Forensic Psychiatry, a section of the journal Frontiers in Psychiatry
ISSN:1664-0640
1664-0640
DOI:10.3389/fpsyt.2021.647450