The leadership team at Sherlock & Dutta Consulting have a strong background in academic research and firmly believes that evidence-based research should underpin decisions. It is against a backdrop of empirical data that sound and efficient administrative decisions can be made.
If you would like to participate in this research please click the button below or scan the QR Code. The survey takes about 10 – 15 minutes to complete and we appreciate your time in doing so.
Despite many well documented cases of racism occurring, there has been limited detailed qualitative and quantitative research into the prevalence and experience of racism, in Tasmania. To address this, Sherlock & Dutta Consulting have successfully secured a State Government grant through the Social Cohesion Grants Program to conduct a State-wide review of the prevalence of racism within Tasmania, which has been auspiced by the Royal Bengal Club Tasmania.
The survey utilises several peer-reviewed, psychometric instruments which have been extensively and independently validated against large sample sets from a wide range of cultural backgrounds. The results of those validations confirm excellent construct validity, reliability and repeatability which indicates that we can expect highly reliable data from the survey and a robust report accordingly.
In conjunction with other researchers, Sherlock & Dutta Consulting will adopt two methodologies for data collection:
- Qualitative Data Collection
A program of interviews will be conducted around the State to collect experiences, which will be recorded and then thematically analysed. A standardised interview methodology will be developed based on well-established, peer-reviewed instruments for the measurement of perceived racism/racial discrimination through information sharing sessions. Additionally, of all the experiences of racism collected, three (3) exemplar cases will be selected and a detailed case study of each will be developed. This process will form part of the qualitative instrument of data collection.
Two questions, adapted to the Tasmanian context from the 2024 Anti-Racism Framework report commissioned by the Australian Human Rights Commission (2024) will be used to collect qualitative data.
- Quantitative Data Collection
Data will be collected on both racist attitudes and incidents of racism through a survey instrument and other sources to capture quantitative data. The survey questions will utilise pre-validated, peer-reviewed instruments that have been developed specifically for the Australian context and previously utilised in academic research on the topic. The quantitative data collections and analysis will be conducted in collaboration with an expert qualitative/quantitative researcher from the University of Tasmania. This survey will be released to numerous professional sectors, peak bodies, businesses, community organisations and government to send to their constituents, member organisations, members and the broader community.
Two specific psychometric instruments will be used to collect the quantitative data:
The PEDQ-CV is specifically designed to measure perceived exposure to ethnic discrimination in community dwelling adults from any ethnic/racial background. It was originally developed by Brondolo et al. (2005) and has been widely used since its development. This version of the PEDQ-CV assesses four subscales related to Lifetime Exposure: Exclusion/rejection, Stigmatisation/disvaluation, Discrimination at work/school and Threat/aggression.
The Racism, Acceptance, and Cultural-Ethnocentrism Scale (RACES) originally developed by Grigg and Manderson (2015) specifically for the Australian context. RACES measures three subscales: Accepting Attitude, Racist Attitudes, Ethnocentric Attitudes and includes a measure of social desirability (Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale). The instrument is intended to be used across all cultural/ethnic backgrounds and is suitable for both adolescents and adults.
This study itself has been approved by the University of Tasmania Human Research Ethics Committee (H0031868). As part of that ethics approval process, measures have been undertaken to address issues such as, including translation or bi-cultural assistance be made available upon request, and a rigorous evaluation of risk/benefits for both the qualitative (information-sharing sessions) and quantitative (Likert survey) methods of data collection.
As part of the research for survey development, pilot consultations, in Tasmania, were undertaken across several groups from different cultural and age backgrounds, who provided extensive feedback on the survey to fine tune its usability. Some questions may appear on the surface to be confusing, but they have been reliably shown by the researchers noted above, and others, to be accurate psychometric instruments for assessing the mental constructs of interest in our study.
Upon completion, a report will be written that analyses the prevalence of racism within Tasmania. The report will be provided to government and made available more broadly to the community.