Would
people be willing to give their personal data for research?
University
of Bristol
New
research led by the University of Bristol has found that over half of people
would be willing to donate their personal data for research to benefit the
wider general public.
The study
published in PLOS
ONE today [Wednesday 20 November] investigated whether the donation
of personal data could be a publicly acceptable act to support the use of
consumer personal data for academic research.
The researchers
developed a new questionnaire that measured individuals' motivations for
donating data, which could be used in future research on data donation in
different contexts, such as medical data.
The questionnaire explored the intentions and reasons of 1,300 people to donate personal data.
The questionnaire explored the intentions and reasons of 1,300 people to donate personal data.
The newly developed questionnaire contained three distinct reasons to donate personal data: an opportunity to achieve self-benefit, prosocial motive to serve society, and the need to understand the purpose of data donation.
Social Duty
considered the desire to serve society and give back to community.
Self-interest reflected the need to gain personal benefits as a results of data
donation, such as reputation and avoiding feeling guilty. Purpose showed the
need to understand the consequences of data donation as well as the importance
of understanding what will be done with the data after donation.
The research
found that the strongest predictor of the decision to donate personal data was
the desire to serve society, while the strongest predictor of the decision not
to donate personal data was the need to gain direct benefits as a result of
data donation.
The study also
identified that in the context of personal data, the need to know the
consequences of donating personal data was an important third factor influencing
the decision whether to donate.
Dr Anya Skatova,
Turing and Vice-Chancellor's Fellow in Digital Innovation and Wellbeing in the
School of Psychological Science, said: "Digital technology opens up a new
era in the understanding of human behaviour and lifestyle choices, with
people's daily activities and habits leaving 'footprints' in their digital
records.
"Our
results demonstrate that these motivations predict people's intentions to
donate personal data over and above generic altruistic motives and relevant
personality traits."
The study is the
first step in opening up the possibilities of a new method that could enable
the use commercial data for research that benefits the public good.
Dr Skatova
added: "The creation and use of data generated by each and every one of us
for industry is here to stay, along with all the good and bad that can entail.
In these times where consumer data is mined by companies, data donation can
redress this power imbalance by providing a safe and ethical route that allows individuals
to explicitly consent to what research organisation they share their data with,
and for what purpose."
The study's
findings could be used to support how the opportunities created by the use of
commercial data in academic research more broadly, and health research
specifically, are communicated.
The research has
also shown that different forms of empathy play a role in defining various
forms of prosocial motivation, which should make a difference in the context of
data donation. Future research could investigate what personality differences
or contextual factors can explain differences in motivations to donate personal
data.