Shahzad, Muhammad Farrukh
Xu, Shuo
Hanif, Sundas
Akram, Shahla
Funding for this research was provided by:
National Natural Science Foundation of China (72074014)
Article History
Received: 24 November 2024
Accepted: 29 May 2025
First Online: 18 June 2025
Competing interests
: The authors declare no competing interests.
: The study was approved by the Research Ethics Committee of Beijing University of Technology, Beijing, China, on April 13, 2023, under the financial project number 72074014. It adheres strictly to ethical standards aimed at safeguarding the rights of human participants, including privacy, confidentiality, informed consent, dignity, protection, and voluntary participation. All processes and procedures followed in this research align with the ethical principles outlined in the Declaration of Helsinki (1964). This approval covers every aspect of the study, such as participant recruitment, data collection and analysis, informed consent procedures, and measures to ensure confidentiality, as specified in the approved protocol.
: Data collection commenced in May 2023, with all participants giving implied informed consent through an online process prior to their involvement. The research team conducted the sessions throughout May 2023, ensuring that ethical standards were strictly followed and informed consent was obtained at the outset of each session. They were presented with detailed information about key aspects of the research, including: (i) confidentiality, which ensured that personal information would remain private and would not be disclosed or published, and (ii) data usage, specifying that all collected data would solely serve academic research purposes without any commercial applications. To participate in the study, participants were required to indicate their understanding and agreement by clicking the “agree and continue” button, which granted them access to the questionnaires.