Announcements

Dear Colleagues,

We are writing to invite your participation in a study exploring the emotional responses to work in human rights archives. We are interested in learning about your experiences working with records that have traumatic potential, supporting users seeking records or information, and assisting individuals who donate records.

This research is being conducted by scholars from the University of Toronto: Professor Wendy Duff, an archival scholar whose current research focuses on community archives and social justice, and Professor Cheryl Regehr, whose recent research examines factors affecting stress and post-traumatic responses in professionals exposed to distressing events within their work context.

The purpose of this study is to better understand the nature of, and factors associated with, the emotional responses of human rights archivists as they work with potentially traumatic records, support researchers working with human rights records or assist individuals donating records. Additionally, we aim to identify how human rights organizations support or fail to support archivists in managing such records. Your responses will contribute valuable insights into how you have responded to working with archival material, archival users, and/or donors. We also hope this study will help us identify ways in which human rights institutions can better support their archival staff.

We will conduct semi-structured interviews on the following topics:

• Experiences working with traumatic records
• Impact of working in human rights archives
• Experiences supporting researchers and donors
• Organizational support and responses

Interviews are expected to last approximately one hour and will be scheduled at your convenience. Due to geographical distances, many interviews may be conducted by phone. If you agree to participate, we will provide you with a consent form for review. After you have reviewed the form and confirmed your consent to participate, we will schedule the interview.  When we schedule the meeting, we will inform you whether a face-to-face interview is possible.  As a token of appreciation, you will receive $50 gift card. Participation in this study is entirely voluntary.

All of your responses will be kept confidential, and you will not be identified in any research reports unless you give us explicit permission. Participation is purely voluntary, and you have the right to withdraw from the study (either partially or fully) at any point in the interview. You may decline to answer any question. Should you decide to withdraw from the research study, your data will not be included in the research, and the recording and/or transcription of your interview will be destroyed upon your request.  Withdrawing from the study will not affect your eligibility to receive a gift card.

We greatly appreciate your consideration of this request and look forward to the possibility of including your valuable insights in our study.

If you have any questions about this request, or would like to schedule an interview please contact Wendy Duff: wendy.duff@utoronto.ca.

Thank you in advance for providing this important feedback.

Sincerely,

Contact for concerns about the rights of research subjects:

The Office of Research Ethics at the University of Toronto requires all investigators to submit an ethical review. If you have any questions or concerns about your rights as a participant in this study, please contactthe Office of Research Ethics by phone (416) 946-3273 or by email at ethics.review@utoronto.ca. 

This research study may be reviewed for quality assurance to ensure that the required laws and guidelines are followed. If this study is chosen for review, a representative of the Human Research Ethics Program may access the study and consent materials as part of the review process. Information accessed by the Human Research Ethics Program will be upheld to the same level of confidentiality stated by the researcher.