ABYSS:RESONANCE

Study Title: Daily dynamics of affect, interoception and emotion regulation around attendance at electronic music events: a diary study

Project Coordinator: Dr. Andrei Ion, Psychology and Cognitive Sciences Department, University of Bucharest.
Partners: the event organizers (Overflow /Abyss) distribute the invitation and have no access to your data.
We are conducting a research study on how emotions, attention to bodily sensations and ways of handling emotions change from day to day, before and after attending the Abyss electronic music event. The study conducted by researchers at the University of Bucharest. It will run from October 2026 to October 2027, involving multiple rounds of data collection.
You are being invited in connection with the Abyss events.
Before deciding whether to participate, it is important that you understand why we wish to conduct this research and what it entails. Please take your time and read the following information carefully. Feel free to ask us if you have any questions or would like further information. Thank you for reading this information. In accordance with Regulation (EU) 2016/679 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data (General Data Protection Regulation), the research team is obligated to manage the data you provide, email address, sociodemographic data, any information about your health and your use of alcohol or other substances that you choose to give, and your questionnaire responses securely and solely for the specified purposes. The data will be fully anonymized once the file linking participant codes to email addresses has been deleted, no later than one month after data collection ends.

What is the study about?
The purpose of the study is to understand the short-term psychological effects of attending an electronic music event: what changes in psychological well-being, how long recovery takes, and what role attention to the body and emotion regulation strategies play. We are not testing any intervention and we do not ask you to do anything differently from what you would do anyway. In this research, we invite you to complete short questionnaires about: positive and negative affect during the day, stressful events, awareness of bodily sensations, emotion regulation, and, in the days after the event, your recovery. The first questionnaire also includes questions about your health (for example, whether you are currently in treatment for a mental health condition or take medication that affects your mood), about mind-body practices, and about your usual use of alcohol and/or other substances at events; the questionnaire after the event also asks about that night and about your sleep. Every one of these questions has a “Prefer not to say” option. We ask them because they shape how the body and emotions react to such an event, not to assess or judge anyone. The questionnaire also collects demographic data (age, gender, city and country of residence, and education level).
The information from the questionnaires will be strictly confidential and used solely for research purposes. It will help us determine whether attending such music and dancing events shapes the relationships between these variables.

Who is invited to participate?
This study invites individuals aged 18 or over who plan to attend the Abyss event, and who are comfortable answering in English. You can stay in the study even if you end up not attending.

Do I have to participate?
It is entirely your decision whether or not to participate. Participation is completely separate from the event: the organizer will not know whether you accepted or declined, and your decision has no effect on your access to the event. If you agree now but change your mind later, you may withdraw from the study at any time, without giving a reason, by writing to the addresses below ([email protected]). This will not affect you in any way. By participating, however, you would be contributing to valuable research with both theoretical and practical benefits.

How often will I be contacted?

Participants who consent will receive eight emails with 7 minutes long questionnaires: one each evening at 20:00 (local time of the event) on the four days before the event and the four days after it. You receive nothing on the day of the event. For each questionnaire you receive a single reminder, at 22:00, if you have not yet answered. We will not contact you for any other purpose, unless you request your personal summary or agree to be contacted about an interview (see below).

What will I be asked to do?
After reading this information sheet and giving your consent by ticking the box at the end of this section, we will ask you to complete the questionnaires. The first questionnaire (listed below) takes about 15 minutes (it also contains a few general questions about you); each of the other seven takes approximately 7 minutes and refers to that respective day, from the time you woke up until the moment you answer. Each questionnaire can be completed until 05:00 the next morning; you can pause and resume.
The total estimated time is about 50 minutes, spread over 8 days.

Does participating benefit me in any way?
Your participation is entirely voluntary and you can receive a discount voucher for attending the Abyss event. The link for the voucher will be automatically generated at the end of completing this first round of survey.

If you wish, after the last questionnaire we will send you a personal summary of your own answers to all the surveys. Some participants find that answering daily questions helps them understand how they respond to such an experience.

Who will have access to the information I provide?
All information we receive from you will be treated as strictly confidential, in accordance with the policies and international ethical standards for high-quality research. Your answers are recorded only under a participant code, not under your name or email. Your email address is used only to send you the questionnaires and, if you want it, your personal summary; it is kept in a separate encrypted file that only the study coordinator can access, and it is removed from all data files. The file linking codes to email addresses will be deleted no later than one month after data collection ends; from that moment the data are anonymous. The event organizer or any other party never receives individual data.

In terms of data and results, only general conclusions and aggregated findings will be reported. Published results will be based on codes, not individual data, and any quotes from open answers will be short and stripped of identifying details.

How will my personal data be used?

If you agree to participate in this study, the research team may complete a research report. This report will NOT include your name, email address or any other identifier; it will only include general conclusions, ensuring your identity is never disclosed.
The research report, containing ONLY anonymized data, may be shared with others in the following ways:

– For further research;

– Included in research databases, without variables that could allow re-identification;

– Used to improve future study designs;

– Used for publishing articles or presenting findings to other researchers;

You have the right to withdraw consent, and to request deletion of your data.

Does my permission expire?
This permission to process personal data expires when the file linking codes to email addresses is deleted, no later than one month after data collection ends.

Who organizes this research?

This research is organized by specialists from the Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences at the University of Bucharest, supervised by Prof. Andrei Ion, (principal investigator) in collaboration with researcher Aoife McGuinness, MSc (co-principal investigator), Dr. Corinna Kuhnapfel (scientific advisor/collaborator), Gabriela Stuparu (doctoral student/research assistant), and Dr. Maria-Stefania Ionel (scientific advisor/collaborator).

Is there any risk to me if I participate in this study?
There are no physical risks. Some questions about mood or health may feel personal; you can skip them or close the questionnaire at any time. The study does not provide psychological assessment or support, and the team does not monitor answers in real time.

Optional interview
In the questionnaire after the event we will ask whether we may contact you about a 30-minute online interview on your experience. You can say no without any consequence; if you say yes, you will receive separate information and will be asked for your consent again before the interview.

Can I ask additional questions?

For further information, please do not hesitate to contact us at the following email addresses: [email protected] / [email protected]/[email protected].

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