Reglamento de la Ley General de Turismo, Decreto Supremo N° 003‐2010‐MINCETUR

1. Would you like to tell me what the term “mindfulness” means to you?

2. What made you opt for practising mindfulness?

3. Why do you practise mindfulness?

4. What is it like to be practising mindfulness?

5. What do you think mindfulness will offer you, if anything?

6. What place, if any, does mindfulness have for you in the future?

7. How would you recommend it to a friend?

8. Is there anything you would like to add about your experience of mindfulness practice?

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Further reflections on ethics issues

To safeguard participants’ confidentiality and for data storage purposes, their names were replaced with pseudonyms. Anonymity was enhanced by not providing lengthy quotes and not including any specific personal demographic details of participants. Prior to the interview, participants were sent by email an information sheet and consent form to read. During the recruitment stage, each participant was briefed in advance on the nature of the study, as well as their rights to confidentiality and anonymity, before they agreed to take part in the study. The researcher’s dual role, as a trainee therapist and a researcher, was also explained, by informing participants that as a researcher the intention is to listen to their experiences and not to address issues or explore change (Thompson & Chambers, 2012).

Before the interviews proceeded, participants were asked to sign the consent form, and were informed that if they became distressed in any way during the interview, without asking they would be free to pause for a break or withdraw at any time without reason, or even to stop the recording equipment. At the end of the interview a debriefing was conducted to check how they were feeling and to answer any questions.

The author experienced challenges with the recruitment process, which resulted in recruiting participants from the same course of which she was a part. The current research project’s time span was only one year, during which all the analysis and writing up had to be

completed. As a result, the researcher anticipated that finding suitable participants might be a challenging process and decided to sign up for an MBSR course, so that participants could become familiar with the researcher and be more willing to participate in the study.

Consequently, the ethical issues of power relations, compliance and social desirability need to be considered. However, before doing this it is important to add that the researcher had monitored her own experiences of the course to prevent undue influence on the interview process. This was done by using a diary to reflect on her own experiences of the practice and the course, involving any reactions and surprises. In addition, some issues about the author’s assumptions and possible influences on the interview and data were taken to supervision.

95 Participants initially were approached with great sensitivity, care and respect so as not to exert power. After the author introduced herself and briefly explained the nature of the mindfulness study, she then asked participants if they would like to take part in this research. This was communicated in an open and inviting way, as the author did not want to put any pressure on them. Once they expressed interest, the author explained what the whole process would involve in detail, how and where the interviews would be conducted and for how long. The information about the study and interviews was emailed to participants.

During the interviews the researcher tried to be aware of the power relations between the interviewer and interviewee, especially as participants are placed in a position of disclosing personal experiences, which can make them feel more vulnerable. In qualitative research participants are asked to talk about and reflect on their experiences, which might stimulate upsetting thoughts and feelings in participants that would not come up otherwise or that they prefer to keep out of conscious awareness. A researcher’s role is to listen to their experiences and ask questions, and to disclose very little or no information about themselves. Therefore, the researcher tried to reduce power differences by encouraging authenticity, building rapport and mutual trust by being empathic and non-judgemental, and providing reflective comments (Karnieli-Miller, Strier & Pessach, 2009). This is why Coyle (1998) emphasised the

importance of a researcher having basic person-centred counselling skills to develop good rapport with participants and to be able to manage affect.

The researcher tried to be sensitive and asked for consent to continue with the interview if any distress or emotional reaction was noticed. In addition, the researcher offered

encouragement and reassurance to participants that she was interested in learning about their unique experiences and that there were no right or wrong answers. During the interview the researcher was mindful of the effect the interview was having on the participants, especially as it might not always be possible to deal with unintended consequences. Therefore, it was important for the researcher to be aware of other forms of support (Willig, 2008), which were included in the information sheet, plus the participants were informed about them prior to and after the interview.

Due to a number of possible emotional reactions to the interview process, Thompson and Chambers (2012) argued that stating whether or not the participants are vulnerable is not as helpful as reflecting on how the specific research topic being addressed might result in participants’ vulnerability. Towards the end of the interview, the researcher created space to

96 discuss whether any emotional distress encountered throughout the interview had reduced and to reflect on the overall experience of the interview. Although most participants spoke about personal matters, none reported experiencing them as too distressing, which would have required counselling intervention. Instead, all participants commented on finding the interview helpful to reflect on their mindfulness experiences and practice.

In addition, the recruitment of participants from the same group of which the researcher was a member potentially could have resulted in an issue of compliance, meaning that those

participants who were approached by the researcher could have felt obliged to take part in the study because they knew the researcher from this group. Fourteen members were approached to take part in the research, but only six agreed, which suggests that the majority were able to refuse to take part. However, it is not known whether those who agreed to take part were influenced by the fact that the researcher was known to them through this group, and whether they would have made a different decision if the researcher had not been part of the same group.

This also leads to another issue, social desirability, where people have a tendency to want to appear to others in the best light, and there are some participants who want to make a positive impression on the researcher (Collins, Shattell & Thomas, 2005).It is possible that some participants might have agreed to take part in the study because they wanted to appear helpful to a trainee researcher. During the interview some participants seemed to prefer to explain different theoretical understandings of mindfulness rather than focus on their own personal experiences, suggesting that they might want to appear knowledgeable and educational to the trainee researcher. This might have been reinforced by the fact that they knew the researcher from the course. It is possible that the need to appear knowledgeable could be due to a power imbalance, especially as the relationship between researcher and interviewee was unequal, as one had to talk about their personal experiences and the other did not. As a result, the

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Appendix E