The Ethical Dimensions Surrounding my Inquiry

What is the motivation behind the inquiry?

My line of inquiry will be surrounding body image and healthy eating/ nutrition in dancers, and within dance settings.
During both my time at dance college and my years of dancing professionally, body image has always been an underlying issue and sensitive subject.
Whether directly or indirectly, body image and dieting has had a negative impact on myself at some point during my career. I have also seen it have a negative impact on my colleagues/ peers at some point. I would like to help change that, using research and a line of inquiry. I am interested in researching how dancers are educated on healthy eating/ body image at college.

Does the Inquirer want to bring about a social good?

I hope that my inquiry will bring about a social good. I particularly hope that when teaching dance in the future, I am able to use my research and line of inquiry to benefit my dance students. That I am able to give them a better education surrounding body image and healthy eating and nutrition, due to my inquiry.

Who stands to benefit most from the research?

I believe that I stand to benefit from my inquiry. I hope that it will aid me in becoming more professional in my practice in the future. I am also aiming for my future dance students to benefit from my inquiry- through the knowledge and understanding I can pass on and teach to them.

Who are the participants?

I am going to endeavour to contact a range of participants. They will be: my peers that I attended college with, students that are still attending that college, past work colleagues, dancers that attend auditions/ dance classes at dance studios in central london and the dance students of a professional associate of mine. This will therefore include a varying range of ages (roughly 16- 35) and varying levels of experience.

Why were these participants chosen?

I decided to choose these participants, as it is likely that all of them will have experienced the effects of diet and body image in dance in varying degrees at some point in their life.
I feel it is important to keep my range of participants quite broad, as this will hopefully give me a wider scope to base my findings on. I feel that each of the participants I would like to get involved, can have a valuable input into my research.

How will you contact them? Will you need to talk to gatekeepers to do this?

I will contact my participants primarily via social media, for example Facebook and Linked In. I will use social media particularly to contact students from The Hammond School, those that I went to college with, and those that are still attending. I may also use groups on Facebook such as 'The Hustle' to contact other professional dancers.
I will get in touch with the principle of The Hammond School via telephone (which may need to go through the gatekeeper) or through a formal email. I will also use email as a means to contact other participants.

How will you make sure that your participants can leave the inquiry if they desire to do so?

I will make it clear when approaching my participants that their involvement is completely voluntary and that they are free to leave the inquiry at any point. I will make sure to do this verbally- if possible, and well as sending an email making it clear what their involvement will mean. I'll also make it clear that their participation, e.g. questionnaire answered will be kept completely confidential and anonymous.

Do the participants have your contact details?

Yes the participants will have my contact details. I will give them my phone number and email address. That way, If they have any questions or concerns, they are able to contact me and speak to me about it.

Are you storing the participants data safely?

Any digital data will be stored on my laptop, that only I have access to. Anything in paper format will be kept confidential and in a secure, locked place, again that only I have access to. After having used the information for my inquiry, all data will be deleted or shredded.