Purpose and design

This study aims to explore the issues around consenting to novel technologies in clinical practice and genetic research. The focus is on what opinions and procedures are held today, how they have developed and what can be learned and applied in the future as novel and increasingly complex situations requiring consent arise. This is a student research project, which is leading towards a PhD in Genetic Counselling. This project has been developed from the student researcher's MSc project, which investigated novel consent issues within a specific context in a clinical setting. The PhD project aims to widen this investigation by considering the issues in further contexts. Qualitative methodologies, namely Documentary Analysis and Thematic Analysis, will be applied to written patient and public informational resources, observational audio-recordings and field notes and interview data in order to address the research questions. A thorough review of the medical ethics and law literature and theoretical models of consent will provide a firm base from which to begin the research. The multifaceted empirical approach will then allow the researcher to become familiar with the context by observing 'consent in action' and completing documentary analysis. These approaches will inform the interviews that follow. The discursive approach to Thematic Analysis will assist in developing a deep understanding of what individuals are doing through their language. This will allow exploration of the meanings and values they associate with consent. The approach will allow repeated patterns of meaning across interviews to be identified and investigated, giving some indication of the diversity of issues and consensus of opinion.