You can reach the study principal investigator Dr. Henrika McCoy at hmccoy@uic.edu or (312) 413-5027.
You can reach the UIC Survey Research Laboratory study coordinator Isabel Farrar at (312) 996-2414 or via the study e-mail at survive@uic.edu.
For concerns about the study or questions about your rights as a research participant, please call the UIC Office for the Protection of Research Subjects (OPRS) at (312) 996-1711 (local) or (866) 789-6215 (toll-free), uicirb@uic.edu. You may reference IRB protocol number 2015-1290.
The first year of the study involves nine focus groups in urban, suburban, and rural Illinois and interviews throughout Illinois. Focus groups are in-depth interviews with a small number of carefully selected people brought together to discuss a topic. We will also be holding one key informant meeting in Chicago with Black women who reside in Illinois, are English-speaking, age 18 or older and are mothers, grandmothers, aunts, sisters, friends, spouses, girlfriends, or significant others of young Black men ages 18 to 24 who have been victimized by violence. This study will fill the gap in our knowledge base about young Black males, and their experiences being victimized by violence, by creating and pilot testing an instrument that measures such experiences. This study will increase what we know about young Black males and their victimization experiences by developing and pilot testing an instrument that captures such experiences. Black males are disproportionately impacted by violence and it often causes their disability or death. To help change that outcome, we need to learn more by generating, collecting, and analyzing data about violent victimization including: what happens, how often it happens, and how many people are impacted.
If you are an English speaking, Black male between the ages of 18 and 24 who has experienced violence, and if you live close enough to one of our focus group or interview locations, you are eligible for the study. The first thing you will do is answer some questions over the phone about yourself and the types of violence you may have experienced. To participate in the key informant meeting, you must be an English-speaking Black female, age 18 or older, who is a mother, grandmother, aunt, sister, friend, spouse, girlfriend, or significant other of a young Black man age 18 to 24 who has been victimized by violence.
We can only involve you once in the study. However, if you like, we can keep your name and phone number in case there’s a way that you could help out later (this would not involve being a study participant again). We’re also happy to send you a summary of the study results at a later date.
Please contact us and we’d be happy to check your eligibility again! Our focus groups in Year 1 may fill up quickly but we will be conducting many more interviews later on. Unfortunately, our key informant group will only be held during year 1 and we will not have additional opportunities in years 2 or 3.
Yes, if you have a friend who you think would meet the eligibility criteria (Black males between the ages of 18 and 24 who have experienced violence or Black women who are older the age of 18 and are mothers, sisters, friends, spouses, girlfriends, or significant others of young Black men ages 18 to 24 who have been victimized by violence). For the focus group, please give them our e-mail address and phone number [survive@uic.edu and (773) 413-8427]. For the key informant meeting, please use the phone number (312) 996-2414 and our email, survive@uic.edu. If he or she is eligible, you may be able to attend the same session as long as this is a friendly relationship. Keep in mind that we do try not to schedule too many people who know each other in the same session.
For our male participants, if you are younger than 18 or older than 24 years old, you aren’t eligible to participate in the study. For our female participants in the key informant group, there is no maximum age, only the minimum age of 18. However, please contact Isabel Farrar at survive@uic.edu, and we will see if there’s way in which you may be able to help out with the recruiting. We value your input and interest in the study!
Yes, you can potentially participate in our key informant meeting. You must be a Black woman, English-speaking, age 18 or older and a mother, grandmother, aunt, sister, friend, spouse, girlfriend, or significant other of a young Black man age 18 to 24 who have been victimized by violence.
There will definitely be interviews taking place during the day and evening, any day of the week. For the focus groups, we will need to accommodate the needs of the majority of participants in your area. If we don’t hold a group during the day and you cannot make an evening group, we will sign you up for an interview instead.
We will only be holding one meeting and we will need to accommodate the needs of the majority of participants. At this time we are unable to tell you at what time the meeting will be held.
The National Institute of Justice (NIJ) is funding this study.
The National Institute of Justice is the research, development and evaluation agency of the U.S. Department of Justice. It is dedicated to improving knowledge and understanding of crime and justice issues through science.
Please contact us! We can answer any questions you have.
You can reach the study principal investigator Dr. Henrika McCoy at hmccoy@uic.edu or (312) 413-5027.
You can reach the UIC Survey Research Laboratory project coordinator Isabel Farrar at (312) 996-2414 or via the study e-mail at survive@uic.edu.
For concerns about the study or questions about your rights as a research participant, please call the UIC Office for the Protection of Research Subjects (OPRS) at (312) 996-1711 (local) or (866) 789-6215 (toll-free), uicirb@uic.edu. You may reference IRB protocol number 2015-1290.
You would need to talk to us on the phone for a few minutes to finish confirming your eligibility and to get scheduled for a focus group or interview. If you participate in a focus group, it would involve coming to a one-time session to talk in a group of approximately seven to ten other young Black males like yourself who have experienced violence. This discussion will be led by a Black male and will take about two hours. You will be paid $50. For the key informant meeting, you would need to talk to us on the phone for a few minutes so that we can determine whether you are eligible. If you are selected to participate, it would involve coming to a one-time session to talk in a group of approximately seven to nine other Black females like yourself who are older the age of 18 and are mothers, grandmothers, aunts, sisters, friends, spouses, girlfriends, or significant others of young Black men ages 18 to 24 who have been victimized by violence. This discussion will be led by a Black female and will take about two hours. You will be paid $50 cash and we will serve refreshments during the session. If you participate in an interview, it would involve coming to our interviewing location and answering questions in a one-on-one setting with a Black male interviewer.
One risk of the research is that you may feel uncomfortable with some of the questions in the screener, focus group, key informant meeting, or interview. However you may decline to answer any questions that you wish, and leave the group, meeting, or interview at any time.
There are no direct benefits to your participation. However, your insights will help the researchers understand more about the issues and concerns surrounding victimization experiences from the perspective of young Black males.
What you say in the focus group, key informant meeting, or interview will only be analyzed and presented in summary form; we will never identify individuals. The interviewer, researcher, and discussion leader will keep everything that is discussed completely private. We will only use your contact information, like name, phone number, and e-mail address, to contact you about the focus group session or the interview.
You will be paid $50 cash to take part in a focus group, key informant meeting, or interview.
We see you as an expert and we want the results from SURVIVE to include your perspective! If you are a Black male between the ages of 18 and 24 and you are in one of our recruiting areas, your experiences and input are incredibly valuable to us. If you are a Black female, older than the age of 18 who is a mother, grandmother, aunt, sister, friend, spouse, girlfriend, or significant other of a young Black man ages 18 to 24 who has been victimized by violence your thoughts, opinions, experiences, and input are also incredibly valuable to us.
We aim to: 1) develop an instrument that captures data about the victimization experiences of young Black men, 2) better understand their victimization experiences, and 3) obtain information needed to better inform policy and practice regarding the criminal justice system’s response to the violent victimization of young Black men.
Please contact Isabel Farrar at survive@uic.edu. Thank you for your interest!
The phone screening is to determine whether you are eligible to be in the study and it will last about 10 minutes.
The phone screening that you will do first will last about 10 minutes. The focus groups will last approximately two hours.
The phone screening that you will do first will last about 10 minutes. The meeting will last approximately two hours.
The interview will take place in person and will last approximately two hours.
We will be asking questions about different types of violence you or a Black male in your life, may have experienced (for example, physical assault, violence in the military, hate crimes, etc.) as well as trying to understand more about the types of services and supports young Black men use. In addition, during the focus groups, and key informant meeting, we want to get your input about the best ways to recruit other young Black males for this study. Many of the questions are sensitive, but we will do everything we can to make you feel comfortable.