Lead researcher: Carol Clark
Faculty: Faculty of Health and Social Sciences
Cluster, centre, institute: Bournemouth University Clinical Research Unit
URA position title: Pain questionnaire development
Relevant disciplines: Physiotherapy, nursing, midwifery, occupational therapy, psychology, sports psychology, Applied Biology Biological sciences
Description of the position: The post will involve a student working with academics to explore the reliability and validity of a questionnaire. Initial development of this questionnaire was carried out last year by a research student.
This questionnaire under development aims to explore interdisciplinary understanding of causes and management of pain. The questionnaire is being designed as part of an online interdisciplinary elearning package for undergraduate students in the Faculty of Health and Social Sciences. The questionnaire will also be employed to explore interdisciplinary understanding of causes and management of pain in clinical practice to enhance pain education and research in this field and to improve the end user experience. Ethics approval through BU research ethics committee has been obtained. The questionnaire has been set up on survey monkey and is ready to be administered to staff and students in BU.
Academics will mentor the student to further their understanding of this topic, to enhance their data analysis and writing skills. The aim is to validate the questionnaire, co-create a paper for publication and to submit an abstract to an international conference (International Association for the Study of
Pain (IASP).
Explain how this position will enhance and enrich the student's undergraduate experience and
how it relates to the relevant courses/disciplines and/or future career of the student: This project will enable a student to work with academics who are experts in their field thus enhancing a breadth of knowledge and understanding. The student will also have the opportunity to be mentored to use
SPSS whilst exploring reliability and validity in a real project.
The project will enable the student to gain valuable real work experience and to enhance their research skills. The academics are keen to mentor a student who has an interest in research to explore this as a future career option at either masters or doctorate level.
This real life project will enable the student to build their self-confidence, work in a ‘safe’ environment and to explore the world of work. Students will be mentored by the academic to develop their project management, writing and presentation skills. This project has transferability as it will enable the student to demonstrate to future employees relevant work experience thus enhancing their CV. This opportunity will enable a student to explore leading and managing a small scale project within a team.
How will the position be supervised and mentored: Initially the academics envisage twice weekly supervision sessions – but this will need to be flexible. In the first week the supervisors will give an introduction to the project and assign some tasks which will be reviewed at the end of the week.
Gradually the student will be encouraged to take ownership of then project and to set their weekly tasks – reporting back to the supervisors on their progress. It is anticipated there will be other UGA’s in the faculty and peer support will be encouraged.
Informal contact with the academics will be available as both have an open door policy.

List of duties and responsibilities of the position: Familiarization of SPSS Familiarization of survey monkey and the on line questionnaire and data collection Administer the questionnaire Start writing an introduction to the paper and the methods Data analysis – Factor analysis, Test re-test reliability construct validity Writing of the results, discussion and conclusion Write the abstract for the paper and the conference paper Power point presentation to the faculty
List the position qualifications including any special requirements (be specific): An understanding of statistics, motivation and enthusiasm