Rebecca Williams, narrates her blog written for the Dementia Researcher website.

In this blog Rebecca talks about the complexities of self-report scales in psychological research. She highlights the common tendency to adopt careless response strategies when completing lengthy questionnaires and discusses the trust placed in participants' meaningful engagement. Rebecca focuses on patients with frontotemporal degeneration-related syndromes, where behavioural symptoms and clinical motivation impact responses. Her study examines unique response strategies, revealing that patients often exhibit invariant, patterned, and internally inconsistent responses. These strategies even predict cognitive factors beyond the scale's intent. Rebecca calls for cautious interpretation of self-report measures, advocating for thorough assumption checks and tailored approaches for specific groups. 

Find the original text, and narration here on our website.

https://www.dementiaresearcher.nihr.ac.uk/guest-blog-self-report-its-not-what-you-say-its-how-you-say-it/

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Rebecca Williams is PhD student at the University of Cambridge. Though originally from ‘up North’ in a small town called Leigh, she did her undergraduate and masters at the University of Oxford before defecting to Cambridge for her doctorate researching Frontotemporal dementia and Apathy. She now spends her days collecting data from wonderful volunteers, and coding. Outside work, she plays board games, and is very crafty. @beccasue99

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This podcast is brought to you in association with Alzheimer's Association, Alzheimer's Research UK, Alzheimer's Society and Race Against Dementia, who we thank for their ongoing support.