Compassion Fatigue: The Potential Impact of Sensitive Research on the Researcher

by Maria K. E. Lahman

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Dr. Lahman served as Mentor-in-Residence for Academic Writing Month in November 2022. She is the author of Writing and Representing Qualitative Research, Ethics in Social Science Research: Becoming Culturally Responsive and the forthcoming Culturally Responsive Qualitative Research. Use the code MSPACEQ122 for a discount when ordering from SAGE Publishing.

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When a researcher works in a sensitive area of research they may also be impacted by the experience. Sensitive research may be due to the topic and/or to the researcher’s past relationship to the topic. Insensitive research handling of sensitive topics on the part of members of the research team particularly those in charge of the research may increase the negative impact for researchers. Sharon Mallon and Iris Elliott (2021) write of sensitive research

it is underpinned by the researcher’s relationship with the topic, both as it exists when they enter the field, and as it develops throughout the fieldwork and into analysis. In addition, it is affected by complex relationships between the researcher, their immediate peers, supervisors and the overall institutional environment in which the research takes place. Sensitive research is thus uniquely ’sensitive’ to the researcher in ways the literature currently fails to fully acknowledge but which are worthy of further examination (p. 534).

Compassion fatigue, or in this case specifically researcher compassion fatigue (RCF), also referred to outside of research as secondary traumatic stress (STS), can occur.  RCF may be discussed anecdotally among researchers but is not often addressed in the methodological literature (Russomanno et al., 2019).

An example of the impact of sensitive research on the researcher is seen in Suzanne Landram’s interview with a  researcher, “Lily,” who studied refugees during a conflict between Iraq and Iran. Lily described how hard some of the interviews were for her emotionally. Her goal was “educating both sides about the circumstances and the situation that they [the refugees] are going through.” Lily went on to share… “There were some …really difficult cases that we had to deal with… I would just sit down and cry after those interviews. It’s hard trying to bring awareness to these types of situations…” (2018, p. 154).

Shared Identities

When the researcher and research participants’ identities or experiences are closely aligned, the researcher may be at risk for even greater fatigue or stress. In research with transgender and non-conforming (TGNC) people where recruitment took place on social media (Russomanno et al., 2019), the posting of the advertisement for the research received hate comments and hate emoji responses. The researchers, who identified as part of the larger LGBTQ community, described themselves as having emotional reactions and compassion fatigue. The researchers wrote, “STS [secondary traumatic stress] can occur when team members are given the ability to see the world through their participants’ eyes. In our study, team members were exposed daily to digital harassment and abuse faced by TGNC community members”.  

In my personal case, during research about pregnancy loss even ten years later, I revisited my pregnancy’s loss when I interviewed people, read transcripts, or worked with the data. I experienced a level of emotional stress I was not prepared for.

Shame and Depression

Additionally, researchers may experience shame or depression as they become fatigued. I was familiar with signs of impending depression, so I stopped working with the pregnancy loss interview data directly. I did not conduct any more interviews or transcribe. I worked more with analysis and research presentations. That left a lingering sense of shame that I have even today as I write about this experience. I have a strong research ethic and believe that when research participants’ give us the gift of their research story, we need to share it with others. Since I had such a strong emotional reaction, the loss of pregnancy data has only been shared at conference research venues.

Recommendations

“Researchers undertaking qualitative research, and particularly qualitative research on sensitive topics, need to be able to make an assessment of the impact of the research on both the participants and themselves” (Dickson-Swift et al., 2008, p. 267). To do so for the researchers, I have the following suggestions.

•  Carefully consider if the researchers are prepared to be part of the study. Have a plan of action if this judgment was incorrect.

  • In addition to reflexively journaling about the process and regular team debriefings

  • Research team members should interview each other at the outset of the research experience. This should include a discussion of any potential sensitive areas.

  • Researchers working independently should create a team of outside researchers they can debrief with. This could be a mutual experience where each researcher shares their current process.

• Seek self-care or the help of a mental health provider if the RCF becomes too much.

• Be open to taking a break from the research or moving into more of a management role.

I address the topics of sensitive research and RCF and other vital, cutting-edge research areas in the text I am currently writing for SAGE Publishing. The working title for the text is Culturally Responsive Qualitative Research.

References

Dickson-Swift, V., James, E. L., & Liamputtong, P. (2008). Undertaking sensitive research in the health and social sciences: Managing boundaries, emotions and risks.

Duvell, F., Triandafyllidou, A., & Vollmer, B. (2008). Ethical issues in irregular migration research. Prepared for work Package of two of the research project CLANDESTINO, Undocumented migration: Counting the Uncountable, Data and Trends Across the Europe, Funded under the 6th Framework program of the European Union.

Landram, S. V. (2018). A methodological review of the cross-cultural ethical dilemmas that exist within the informed consent process: When ethical considerations in human research differ (Order No. 10928371). Available from Dissertations & Theses @ University of Northern Colorado. (2133019390).

 Russomanno, J., Patterson, J. G., & Tree, J. M. J. (2019). Social media recruitment of marginalized, hard-to-reach populations: Development of recruitment and monitoring guidelines. JMIR Public Health and Surveillance, 5(4), e14886.

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