Australian government promotes trauma-informed practices in research. Is there evidence to support these methods?

CATEGORY: GOVERNMENT PROJECTS

Jasmine B. MacDonald, Ph.D.

Source: Australian Institute of Family Studies
Read time: 2.0 minutes
 
This Happened
In August 2024, an Australian government agency issued a “practice guide” for researchers on how to conduct trauma-informed research.
 
Who Did This?
The first author on the report was psychologist Jasmine MacDonald, a Research Fellow in the Australian Institute of Family Studies (AIFS). She has six first-author and five secondary-author research papers. Her first-author papers include literature reviews on depression and post-traumatic stress purportedly caused by the mental stress of being a journalist. She has conducted one study involving original data collection of trauma reactions (an online questionnaire of TV camera operators).
Her four co-authors on the report have conducted zero studies on trauma reactions.
The AIFS is an Australian Government agency. Its mission is “to conduct high-quality, impartial research into the wellbeing of Australian families” that can influence government policy and services for families.

​The Premise
The practice guide, titled “How To Do Trauma-Informed Research and Evaluation,” is thirteen pages of text. The aim was to provide “evidence-informed, practical insights for doing trauma-informed research and program and service evaluation in a way that is accessible and safe for participants who may or may not have experienced trauma.”
This guidance, it was emphasized, was intended for all research—even that which does not study trauma—because there will always be some participants who have experienced trauma. The central concept was to create exceptionally safe research environments because research with trauma victims could inadvertently cause retraumatisation, or cause new trauma in the researchers through their work exposure of hearing about trauma.

​Most of the recommendations are already part of common sense IRB guidelines on how to obtain informed consent and respect participants’ privacy. But many recommendations were novel. The five sections used to organize the report and some of the more unique recommendations follow:
1. Planning and design
Consider how your research can be strengthened by “anti-oppressive” and “decolonising” frameworks.
2. Participant screening and recruitment
When recruiting a victim of trauma, the individual must be called “victim-survivor,” not “victim.”
3. Data collection
When collecting data, “use a location that is familiar.”
If participants would rather interact with their clinician rather than a research assistant, that should be accommodated.
Let participants choose where they sit.
Make sure recording devices are positioned so they do not “reinforce power imbalance.”
Encourage participants to bring support persons during the research.
Avoid “asking ‘why’ questions as these may be perceived as judgmental.”
“Start with the least sensitive questions and gradually move to questions about sensitive content.”
4. Analysis and dissemination
“Consider applying an intersectional lens to the data.”
5. Project team self care
As a researcher, “Reflect on your own traumatic experiences” throughout the research project and have a self-care strategy in place to keep you “grounded and calm.”
 
Analysis
The authors added a not-so-small caveat on the final page: “To date, there is a lack of evaluation of the impact of trauma-informed strategies on outcomes for participants in research and evaluation projects. We do not yet know if these approaches are achieving their intended goal and purpose of minimising negative impacts on participants or whether there are any unintended outcomes.” In other words, there are no data to show these recommendations are effective for any outcome and may instead by harmful (see similar conclusions here).
The authors provided assurance, however, that they were experts because “The literature informing this practice guide was mostly based on the experiential learnings that authors have had while conducting their own case study or research/evaluation projects.” They neglected to mention that none of the authors have experience interacting with a live human research participant who has experienced trauma.
This guide is the nightmare for most clinical researchers. If university IRB committees adopted these practice guides, standardized or efficient research would not be feasible on any clinical population.