Children and Teenagers

Children may be the end users of your product, and they will be glad to tell you exactly what they think too. Saros Research can help you reach the right research participants to provide this vital insight. Recruitment of children and teenagers for qualitative research and user experience. ‘From the mouths of babes’ – if you want to know the truth about the emperors new clothes, or your product, ask a child! They won’t hold back.

And of course many products are designed and targeted specifically at younger end users, from toys and media through to apps and games. Making sure they are appealing and fit for purpose with the intended audience is of course a vital part of the development cycle, even if the kids themselves are less likely to be making the actual purchase.

We’ve been recruiting children as research participants for many years, and the feedback we get from our young respondents is that they really love the experience. Getting to try out new toys or games, seeing a bit behind the scenes with some of their favourite brands or characters, and getting a glimpse of future versions of products they know – all the same things which appeal to adult participants are true for kids of any age. And being welcomed, entertained and listened to by friendly, engaged and non-patronising grown-ups is always a pleasant experience.

Membership of the Saros database is only open to people over 16, but of course many of those are parents. And because of our membership structure we have an existing relationship with those parents, whether or not they have taken part in research yet themselves.

All recruitment of young people is undertaken through the parents or guardians initially of course, because their consent and involvement is required at all times. They will complete the initial screening and questionnaires on behalf of the young person they are nominating, and they will be expected to accompany them and remain present with younger participants throughout the research session.

Depending on your activities and objectives, as well as the age of your participants, you may want to have the chaperones in a separate space with viewing of the research, or it may be more reassuring to have them in the same room and visible to the kids taking part. They will need some briefing from the research team as to their role and expected involvement, even to the extent of a polite request to keep quiet and let the kids speak up themselves. And they will of course need refreshments and incentives of their own. It may be helpful if they can bring younger siblings too depending on timings - being able to offer this certainly opens up recruitment, as well as indicating the level of family-friendly consideration the research is backed-up by.

When it comes to incentives for the children, this is one of the rare situations where we’d tend to recommend something other than cold hard cash. A voucher like WHSmiths can be spent on so many different things the child can choose for themselves, and additional gifts of merchandise are always appreciated. The parent/guardian accompanying will need a cash incentive though to cover their costs in attending.

Moderating/interviewing children is a specialist area, and we like to be able to tell our members when inviting them to apply that the researchers involved will be experienced in this role. It’s also very reassuring to parents to be able to indicate that those involved will have a current police CRB check.

Some further points to consider when planning or designing research for young people, based on feedback from participants and researchers we have worked with:

Recruiting friendship pairs or small groups can help overcome shyness and break the ice, as well as increasing accountability (though it may take longer to recruit, it’s worth it)

However, depending on the content of your discussion guide, be aware of the potential impact of peer pressure on disclosure. In the same way as the anonymity of a group of strangers can help adults share freely, with some subjects knowing their friends will never find out could be a positive assist.

Kids often think more literally than adults, with less grasp of intangibles and abstractions. Try to have plenty of props and visual stimulus they can relate to and ask direct, clear, and non-metaphorical questions
With shorter attention spans, a range of different kinds of activities and chances to move around, handle things and use a range of thinking styles, all help to get good results. Even older groups like teens have very different ways of focusing and engaging, as every frustrated parent of a post-millennial has learned
Kids of all ages love games and competition. Many traditional research activities can be creatively gamified, such as getting small groups to compete to make the best collage or come up with the most uses of an object…
Groups can work well when closely matched by age and gender. Particularly with teens, mixing boys and girls can reduce some participants to mute mumblers
Kids will tell it like it is – when they truly feel safe to speak their minds, they will do so, very freely and honestly, and they won’t be worried about what your clients behind the mirror might be thinking or what the polite thing to say is. So you need to be ready for that and manage expectations accordingly!

If you’d like to talk about involving children and adolescents as research participants, give us a call. Most of the Saros team are parents too, and we can help you plan the perfect project to get useful input from your youngest customers.

More of our Market Research Specialisms...

Complex Qualitative

Food and Drink

Mobile Communications