Family and Friends Forum evaluation update
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Dear Forum users,
Thank you so much to all of you who participated in the research, led by Rachel Armitage at Huddersfield University, evaluating the Forum earlier this year. We know that Rachel and her team had a fantastic response to their requests for participants, with over 120 people completing the online survey and 20 people being interviewed, in depth, by the researchers. As you can imagine, this has generated a wealth of information about your experiences as people affected by someone else’s online sexual offending and about your views of the forum itself. Thank you so much.
Your feedback about the forum has been overwhelmingly positive, about which we are delighted. For example, 69% of you who completed the online survey said you felt less judged; 60% less alone; and 58% more listened to, as a result of using the forum. That is really heartening to read, and is testament to the support you have offered to each other. You might also be interested to know that use of the forum has grown since its launch three years ago. For example, between April and July of this year, the forum had been accessed by over 13,000 people in the UK, and over 2,500 posts had been made by 391 active users. These figures show that many people value reading the forum even if they do not post on it themselves.
As we hoped, the evaluation has generated lots of suggestions for how we might make the forum even better. Recommendations include:
Technical improvements – improving the search function; being notified when someone responds to your post; being able to block responses to your post; the ability to ‘tag’ other forum users; preventing you being ‘timed out’ when writing your posts; ensure new users’ posts appear when moderated rather than when written i.e. at the top of a thread.
Messaging and signposting on the forum – ‘health warnings’ that some content might be distressing to read; further reminders about the public nature of the forum; structuring the content in a way that would enable users to be signposted to posts most relevant to their situation.
Moderation – LFF to contribute more frequently to discussions to provide greater balance and correct misinformation, when necessary.
Public / Private nature of the forum – to consider the merits and viability of providing a private space through which forum users can connect with one another e.g. having a section of the forum that is only accessible to registered users; being able to ‘direct message’ other forum users; and/or providing a ‘matching system’ through which LFF can put users in contact with one another.
For now, please rest assured that we are giving serious thought to all of these recommendations, and seeking quotations for the cost of the suggested technical changes. We will keep you informed of the changes we make, and, as ever, will welcome your feedback.
Thank you so much.
Lucy
Thank you so much to all of you who participated in the research, led by Rachel Armitage at Huddersfield University, evaluating the Forum earlier this year. We know that Rachel and her team had a fantastic response to their requests for participants, with over 120 people completing the online survey and 20 people being interviewed, in depth, by the researchers. As you can imagine, this has generated a wealth of information about your experiences as people affected by someone else’s online sexual offending and about your views of the forum itself. Thank you so much.
Your feedback about the forum has been overwhelmingly positive, about which we are delighted. For example, 69% of you who completed the online survey said you felt less judged; 60% less alone; and 58% more listened to, as a result of using the forum. That is really heartening to read, and is testament to the support you have offered to each other. You might also be interested to know that use of the forum has grown since its launch three years ago. For example, between April and July of this year, the forum had been accessed by over 13,000 people in the UK, and over 2,500 posts had been made by 391 active users. These figures show that many people value reading the forum even if they do not post on it themselves.
As we hoped, the evaluation has generated lots of suggestions for how we might make the forum even better. Recommendations include:
Technical improvements – improving the search function; being notified when someone responds to your post; being able to block responses to your post; the ability to ‘tag’ other forum users; preventing you being ‘timed out’ when writing your posts; ensure new users’ posts appear when moderated rather than when written i.e. at the top of a thread.
Messaging and signposting on the forum – ‘health warnings’ that some content might be distressing to read; further reminders about the public nature of the forum; structuring the content in a way that would enable users to be signposted to posts most relevant to their situation.
Moderation – LFF to contribute more frequently to discussions to provide greater balance and correct misinformation, when necessary.
Public / Private nature of the forum – to consider the merits and viability of providing a private space through which forum users can connect with one another e.g. having a section of the forum that is only accessible to registered users; being able to ‘direct message’ other forum users; and/or providing a ‘matching system’ through which LFF can put users in contact with one another.
For now, please rest assured that we are giving serious thought to all of these recommendations, and seeking quotations for the cost of the suggested technical changes. We will keep you informed of the changes we make, and, as ever, will welcome your feedback.
Thank you so much.
Lucy
Thank you for your feedback LFF, it's good to read others had similar opinions as me and I look forward to the changes in the future.