Question: "donating my anonymized data" checkbox
Under "My Settings", there is a an option called "Research Data" where I can check a box for "I want to improve mental health outcomes by donating my anonymized data". I'm curious to learn more about this.
1) What exactly is the effect of me checking this box? What data of mine from this site are actually being collected and donated?
2) Are 7Cups chat data saved and included as part of this? What about forum posts?
3) Re: the word "donating", does 7Cups actually earn any revenue from this?
These questions aren't driven by data privacy concerns so much as curiosity. I'm thrilled to give 7Cups any/all of my data that they can use, and am just curious how much Big Brother is collecting/how useful it is. :)
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Here are my current guesses at responses to these questions. Am curious whether these are accurate.
1) What exactly is the effect of me checking this box? What data of mine from this site are actually being collected and donated?
By checking this box, I am providing consent for any responses I provide to screening questionnaires on 7Cups (e.g. DASS-21) to be given to universities or government-affiliated organizations for use in social sciences research.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/07/the-smartphone-psychiatrist/528726/
I am also consenting to be included in a pool of people who researchers can contact if they are looking for research study participants.
https://www.7cups.com/about/research.php
Beyond this, checking the box doesn't have any practical effects.
2) Are 7Cups chat data saved and included as part of this? What about forum posts?
No. In general, 7Cups doesn't actually save any chat transcripts. This is by design so that one-on-one chats remain completely confidential. Even the people who help maintain the 7Cups website don't have any way of easily accessing these data because they aren't permanently stored anywhere. The user reporting and listener review functions operate based on the honors system.
Member forum posts are already publicly available data that can be viewed/collected by anyone. If a researcher wanted to and had the tools, they could comb through this without needing consent from 7Cups users. So, this also isn't what the "anonymized data" is referring to.
3) Re: the word "donating", does 7Cups actually earn any revenue from this?
No. 7Cups only earns revenue from charitable donations and referral fees from therapy sessions performed on 7Cups. There isn't any sort of Google/Facebook-esque thing happening where my data is being sold.
https://www.pcmag.com/news/365342/holiday-blues-heres-how-7-cups-digitized-the-comfort-of-st