Best practice for collecting anonymous data

Collecting anonymous data using the Public Survey Link:

Responses can only be collected truly anonymously using the Public Survey Link.

The survey questionnaire must not contain any questions asking the participants for identifying data such as name, email address, etc.

Multiple Surveys/Longitudinal Studies: Projects with multiple surveys present challenges to anonymous data collection. If you are analyzing data in aggregate, you can have multiple REDCap projects, each using the Public Survey Link. If you need to track individual responses over time, using the Public Survey Link for each survey (pre, post, follow-up) requires that you collect data points within the survey questionnaire to later export and merge. The data points should not be identifying information, but specific enough questions that a participant will enter answers consistently such as the last 5 digits of their first phone number, the make and model of their first car, etc.

Projects containing data entry forms and surveys cannot be considered anonymous. Manually entered data needs to be identified by the team to be properly associated and linked with survey responses.

Can I collect anonymous survey data using the Participant List?

Technically, no. Data is not anonymous when collected using the Participant List; although it can appear anonymous to the project administrators. In other words, there is no direct, viewable link for project administrators between the email address in the Participant List and the actual record as long as the participant Identifier feature is disabled

REDCap's user interface has two separate modules for inviting/tracking participants and viewing data/responses. Through the REDCap interface, there is no link between the modules and no connection between the email address entered and the responses collected unless you enable and enter unique values into the "Participant Identifier (optional)" field.

To ensure the confidentiality of the data, REDCap tracks responses by associating them with an email address. If the Participant Identifier field is not used, project administrators are not privy to this information. Access to the association between the individual who took the survey and the survey responses is restricted in the database and can only be accessed by authorized privileged users (system engineers and database admins).

Therefore, if you truly need anonymous data, use the Public Survey Link.

For additional assistance, please contact the cru@ucalgary.ca