Towards a positive research environment after a change in doctoral supervision

Towards a positive research environment after a change in doctoral supervision

Information Page – Ethics Reference 3715-3946

Why are we doing this study?
The aim of this study is to identify how students should be best supported following a change in doctoral supervision. Here, we define a change in doctoral supervision as:

the departure of a supervisor with significant supervision responsibilities (defined as being formally listed as one of your supervisors during candidature) from the supervisory team
the addition of a new supervisor with significant supervision responsibilities
a significant reassignment of supervisor responsibilities within the existing supervisory team

A change in doctoral supervision can be permanent (e.g., following a breakdown of student-supervisor relationship; a supervisor moving to a different institution; or a change in research expertise required), or temporary (e.g. due to long-term work leave of a supervisor).

Who is invited to take part in this study?
You are invited to take part in this study if you are or have been a doctoral (PhD or Professional Doctorate) student at the University of Bath within the last three years, who has experienced any change in doctoral supervision.

We are conducting a similar survey of doctoral supervisors and other University staff.

What is involved in the study?
The study consists of an 10-minute survey.

There will be some questions about yourself and your degree that will be used to determine if there are any key areas that could be focussed on for improvements (e.g., according to student demographic or Faculty of study).

The study also includes questions about your experiences with changing doctoral supervision. This includes questions about both the reasons for this change, and the process of changing supervisors itself.

What are the risks of taking part in the study?
Depending on your experiences of changing doctoral supervision, you might find some of the questions or topics of the survey unpleasant to dwell on. If you experience any concerns or distress while answering the survey questions, you can contact the researchers (contact details below), student wellbeing services, the Independent Advisors for doctoral students, or the Samaritans.

What are the benefits of taking part?
This study will benefit doctoral students and staff at the University of Bath who are involved in a change in doctoral supervision, by informing an understanding of how best to support people during such a transition. Also, at the end of the survey you will be provided with a link to enter a prize draw for £50 Amazon voucher. The information for the prize draw will be collected in a separate survey and it will not be possible to link it back to your survey responses.

What will happen to my data?
The data will be screened by the researchers for any potentially identifying or sensitive information, which will be removed before further analysis. The data will be quantitatively and qualitatively analysed and the results used in the development of a best practice guide for anyone involved in doctoral supervision (e.g., doctoral students, doctoral supervisors, Directors of Studies for Doctoral Research, the Doctoral College, and University academic departments). This guide will outline how best to support doctoral students who are undergoing a change in supervision. We will also share our findings with University of Bath Student Support Services, the Independent Advisors for PhD students, and Human Resources.

We may also present our results to research and educational bodies outside the University of Bath and submit a journal article based on our results to disseminate our findings and suggestions more widely. This could include sharing the anonymous data with other researchers by uploading it to an online data repository, according to research best practice.

How will confidentiality be protected?
The data will be anonymised, meaning that it will not be associated with your name or other contact information. Although we will collect demographic information about you (e.g. age, sex) and your degree (e.g. Faculty of study), we will not analyse these on an individual level. You will be able to opt out of these questions if you don’t want to provide this information. We might quote your answers to open-ended questions when presenting our results within the University of Bath and externally in talks and a journal article. If we do so, we will use a pseudonym and it will not be possible to link the quote back to you.

To protect the confidentiality of yourself and other people, we will also ask you to avoid using real names or other identifying information when referring to people in your responses.

How can I withdraw from this study?
Once you have started the survey, you can withdraw at any time and for any reason by closing the browser window. After you have completed the survey, it will not be possible for you to withdraw your responses from our dataset, because it will not be possible to identify which data are yours.

Who is funding this study?
This study is funded by the University of Bath as part of an Enhancing Research Culture grant from Research England.

Who do I speak to if I have questions about this study?
If you have any questions about the research, please contact Dr Janet Bultitude (j.bultitude@bath.ac.uk) or Dr Leda Blackwood (l.blackwood@bath.ac.uk).

Ethics details.
This study has received ethical approval from the Social Sciences Research Ethics Committee of the University of Bath (date:25/03/2024, reference: 3715-3946).