Which additional safeguard may be important in a social and behavioral study?

In social and behavioral studies, removing all direct identifiers from the data as soon as possible serves as a crucial safeguard to protect participant privacy and confidentiality. By eliminating identifiers such as names, addresses, and phone numbers, researchers reduce the risk of participants being re-identified if the data were to be accessed by unauthorized individuals or if there were a data breach. This practice aligns with ethical guidelines that emphasize protecting participant identity, thus fostering trust between researchers and participants.

While securing data on a server is important and using pseudonyms also contributes to confidentiality, removing direct identifiers provides a stronger layer of protection by ensuring that even if data were leaked, there would be minimal risk to the individual's privacy. Conducting follow-up interviews, while beneficial for research purposes, does not specifically enhance data protection in the same way that handling identifiers does. Therefore, timely removal of identifiers becomes a fundamental practice in safeguarding sensitive information in social and behavioral research.