Please read this information carefully, together with your children under the age of 18, to decide if it is suitable and that you each wish to take part.

Explanation of the Research
We invite you and/or your child to complete an online survey about concussion in community sport. The survey explores what you know about sport concussion, your attitudes towards sport concussion safety, and how your sport environment (e.g. coaches, teammates, parents and club policies and facilities) affect concussion management. You can answer the survey as a player, parent, coach or official (e.g. umpire, club administrator/president). The survey will also ask for your age, level of education, location (rural or metropolitan Melbourne), length of time in the sport and the level you participate at.

The intended benefits of the study are to inform better prevention and management of concussion in community sport. Findings will help improve education, club practices, and policies to make sport safer for everyone.

What's involved?
If you and/or your child are happy to participate, and they agree, you may provide consent below and proceed to the survey. Answering the survey should take no longer than 15 minutes. It is an anonymous and voluntary involvement. If you and/or your child choose not take part in the survey, you can exit the survey at any time. For children aged 10-14 years, parents/guardians are asked to complete the survey on behalf of their child, but answers recorded should reflect your child’s own thoughts. Except for a few key questions, you and your child may choose not to respond to any particular questions. Participants are not obliged to answer all questions. You or your child may withdraw consent and stop participating at any time, but once answers are submitted, it will not be possible to withdraw them. The data that is collected will remain confidential, subject to legal limitations, and we will not ask for names or personal identifying information. Legal limitations refer to information that is legally required to be provided, generally through processes such as subpoena, freedom of information or mandatory reporting.

You and your child may indicate whether you would like to provide relevant personal details to be contacted to hear about the results or participate in future research on this topic, on the understanding any personal details participants provide, to be contacted for future research, will be stored confidentially with access only to named researchers and will not be linked to survey responses.

What will happen to your responses?
Your survey responses will remain completely anonymous - no names or identifying details will be requested. All data will be combined and reported as group results in publications and/or presentations about concussion prevention and management in sport. Sport organisations will not see individual responses or raw data, but findings may help create safer environments for players.
Your data will be securely stored on a password-protected computer system at Federation University Australia and archived accordingly to university policy. If you wish, you can receive a summary of the study results. In the future, other researchers may request access to the anonymous data to inform new projects, but your identity will never be known. All information provided will be unidentifiable and stored in perpetuity, monitorable only by the Principal Researcher.

Potential risks or discomforts
There is little or no risk for participants completing the survey. Some questions ask about personal experiences with sport concussion, which may cause mild discomfort, when recalling these events. This is expected to be brief and manageable. If you feel concerned about discomfort, you can stop the survey immediately. We encourage you to contact your GP or access support services such as Headspace, Kids Helpline or Beyond Blue for assistance.
For concussion-specific advice and recovery support, you can visit Concussion Australia  or call the Concussion Hotline for guidance on symptoms, management, and return-to-play protocols.