Informed Consent / Participant Information Sheet
Interpersonal Skill Preparedness and Expectations During the Transition From Veterinary Training to Independent Practice
Key Information
Please read this summary before deciding whether to take part. More detail follows below.
• You are invited to take part in a research study about the interpersonal skills veterinarians use in clinical practice.
• Taking part is voluntary. You may stop at any time.
• The survey is anonymous. We do not collect your name, email address, employer, or IP address.
• The survey takes about 13–16 minutes.
• There are no anticipated risks beyond those of everyday life, and you will not be paid.
• If you agree, your anonymous responses may also be used in future research.
Who is conducting this study?
This study is led by Matthew Love, Psy.D. (Principal Investigator), an independent investigator. Edwina Love, DVM, DACVIM (Oncology), serves as a sub-investigator. You may contact the Principal Investigator at mlove@matthewlovepsyd.com.
Why is this study being done?
The study examines how prepared veterinarians feel in key interpersonal skills and how important those skills are for effective clinical practice. The goal is to identify where preparedness falls short of importance so that training and professional development can be improved.
Investigator disclosure
This study is conducted independently by Matthew Love, Psy.D., as a needs assessment, gathering profession-wide information about interpersonal skills and professional quality of life in veterinary medicine to help identify training gaps. Please be aware that the Principal Investigator is developing a leadership-development framework (the REAL Leadership Framework) that is general in focus and not specific to veterinary medicine. This survey does not evaluate, test, or market that framework or any other product or service. The anonymous, aggregate information from this survey may later inform the investigator's general thinking about leadership development; any comparison with that framework would happen only after the main planned analyses and would not affect this study. The study's hypotheses and analysis plan are registered in advance on the Open Science Framework (OSF), a public research registry, in the interest of transparency. Your participation is anonymous, your responses cannot be linked to you, and no identifying information will ever be accessed or used for any commercial purpose. Your participation is voluntary, and you may stop at any time.
What will I be asked to do?
If you choose to take part, you will complete a one-time online survey of about 13–16 minutes. For each interpersonal competency (such as communicating with colleagues and support staff, giving and receiving feedback, managing conflict, and coordinating a team), you will give two ratings: how important it is and how prepared you are. You will also read a brief workplace scenario involving a veterinary team interaction and describe how you would respond, answer a few questions about your training and practice context, and complete a brief, validated wellbeing questionnaire about professional fulfillment and burnout (the Professional Fulfillment Index). The wellbeing section is optional; you may skip it if you prefer. You may stop at any time before submitting.
Is my participation voluntary?
Yes. Participation is entirely voluntary. You may stop at any time before submitting without any penalty or consequence. If you received this survey from a colleague or someone you know, your choice to take part or not is entirely your own; declining has no consequences, and because the survey is anonymous, no one, including the person who shared it with you, can tell whether you responded. Because responses are anonymous, once you submit the survey it cannot be withdrawn, as we will have no way to identify which responses are yours. If you exit the survey before submitting, any responses you have entered up to that point may be recorded by the survey platform; because the survey is anonymous, these partial responses cannot be linked to you, and partial responses that do not include the complete core competency ratings will not be included in the study analysis.
What are the risks and benefits?
Risks are minimal and are not expected to exceed those of ordinary daily life. There is no direct benefit to you. The study may benefit the profession by informing veterinary education, residency training, and professional development. If any of the wellbeing questions raise difficult feelings, you may wish to reach out to a trusted colleague or an appropriate professional or wellbeing resource, for example, the AVMA Wellbeing Resources (avma.org/resources-tools/wellbeing) or, in the United States and Canada, the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline (call or text 988).
How is my privacy protected?
The survey is anonymous. We do not collect names, email addresses, employer information, or IP addresses. Responses are collected through Alchemer over an encrypted connection and stored on a password-protected, encrypted device accessible only to the Principal Investigator. If you provide any identifying detail in an open-ended response, it will be removed during analysis. Because no identifiers are collected, study results will only be reported in aggregate and cannot be linked to you. If you are responding from Canada or outside the United States, please note that your survey responses are processed and stored in the United States and may be subject to United States law.
Will my responses be used in future research?
Because your responses are anonymous, the de-identified dataset may be retained for up to seven years and used for future research and analyses during that period, after which it will be securely deleted. No identifying information will be associated with the data at any point.
Whom can I contact with questions?
For questions about the study, contact Matthew Love, Psy.D., at research@matthewlovepsyd.com. For questions about your rights as a research participant, contact WCG IRB at 855-818-2289 or clientcare@wcgclinical.com.
Statement of Consent
By selecting 'I agree to participate' below, you confirm that you have read and understood this information, that you are 18 years of age or older, and that you voluntarily agree to take part in this research. If you do not wish to participate, simply close this window.
No signature is required. This information sheet is provided under a waiver of documentation of consent appropriate for an anonymous, minimal-risk survey; affirmative selection of 'I agree to participate' records the participant's consent.