Understanding Society - the UK Household Longitudinal Study IP18 v1
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Understanding Society Innovation Panel Wave 18: Microbiome sample collection from the Innovation Panel of the UK Household Longitudinal Study
IRAS ID
346324
Contact name
Michaela Benzeval
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University of Essex
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, 7 months, 31 days
Research summary
Understanding Society is an annual longitudinal survey of UK households which aims to investigate changes in people’s lives. We have previously (2010-12) collected objective measures of people’s health and are currently collecting another wave of bio-data collection (2024-26). Alongside the value of repeating biomarkers already collected, we wish to stay at the forefront of bio-social research. The microbiome has been identified as important to a variety of health outcomes, including obesity, mental health and dementia. However, analyses have largely used clinical or non-representative samples and there is a need to understand microbiome measurements across general population samples. We plan to use the Understanding Society Innovation Panel Wave 18 population sample, our methodological experiment platform, to test how participation in the microbiome sample collection can be increased, with a view to the development of protocols that enable the roll-out of this collection in the main Understanding Society survey.
Participants will be allocated to two groups: (i) “participant-led web” where participants are invited to complete an online survey, with self-collection of a microbiome sample; and (ii) “interviewer-led” with an interviewer collecting survey data, with self-collection of a microbiome sample. Across both groups, participants will be randomly allocated to seven microbiome sample treatment groups. Participants in certain groups will be provided with additional information about the sample collection and shown supporting videos, and/or offered feedback of their results. Participants will also be asked whether they have collected a sample in the past and about their attitude to the sample collection. In addition, we plan to implement six other non-health related experiments. We would expect the interview to last approximately 43 minutes.
Pseudo-anonymised data from the Innovation Panel Wave 18 survey will be deposited in the UK Data Service to enable further research from this study.
REC name
South Central - Hampshire A Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
24/SC/0316
Date of REC Opinion
11 Oct 2024
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion