COVID‑Knowledge, Attitudes, and Perceptions: A Pilot Model for Student‑led, Low‑cost, High‑Impact International Collaborative Research

<p>The notion of professors and students working together to achieve knowledge and the idea that research should inform teaching is sacrosanct in higher education, but in reality, this has been difficult to maintain as universities have expanded. Moreover, now, there is an increasing separation of personnel into research or teaching roles. The purpose of this study is to investigate the COVID‑knowledge, attitudes, and perceptions (KAP) a pilot model for student‑led, low‑cost, high‑impact international collaborative research. The COVID‑KAP project is a student‑led hybrid social science qualitative research project that seeks to use individual interviews and focus group discussions to collect data on KAPs of the government’s response to COVID‑19. These results will be compared between rural and urban communities in each country, as well as between the four different countries involved. This study has a standardized data collection instrument used in four countries. The project was carried out by a team of academics and postdoctoral researchers from the University of Lincoln in the UK, the University of Johannesburg in South Africa and Herpezi, a research organization based in Lusaka, Zambia, in equitable partnership with research institutions in Cameroon, Gabon, and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Such student‑led collaborative projects can be incorporated into a wide range of observational and interventional research studies. Furthermore, the COVID‑KAP model is innovative as it seeks to use established research networks to implement collaborative student‑led research projects. Supervising academics at each site will also benefit from the outputs and research networks and support provided by the consortium to their students. The student‑led model presented by the COVID‑KAP study would be adoptable in many research fields,including but not limited to biomedical and bioveterinary research, clinical trials, psychology, social science, geology, geography, conservation, and ecological research.</p>