• Wilson J
• Wates RJ
• Sandefur R
• McDonald WP
• Pfefer MT

• Affiliation / Cleveland University Kansas City
• Affiliation / Cleveland University Kansas City. College of Chiropractic
• Affiliation / Cleveland University Kansas City. Research Department
• Affiliation / Private Practice
• Affiliation(G) / United States / Kansas / Overland Park
• Affiliation(G) / United States / West Virginia / Charleston
• Chiropractic / psychology
• Crowdsourcing
• Feasibility Studies
• Health Care Surveys
• Patient Acceptance of Health Care / statistics and numerical data
• Stakeholder Participation
• Surveys and Questionnaires / methods
• United States

OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study was to determine the feasibility and utility of using Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk) for online surveys of US adults about their perceptions of chiropractors and to report differences between people who have positive versus negative attitudes toward chiropractic care.

METHODS: A 74-item, unvalidated survey was developed through iterative review to assess attitudes of respondents to chiropractic, including a query stratifying respondents based on previous and future use of chiropractic (have used, would consider; have used, would not consider; have not used, would consider; have not used, would not consider). The electronic survey was delivered using Qualtrics; respondents were recruited using MTurk, a crowdsourcing website. Descriptive statistics, including frequencies and cross tabulations, were performed.

RESULTS: A total of 1300 responses were obtained. Consistent with previous reports, 32.2% of the respondents reported having seen a chiropractor in the past. Chiropractic care was perceived as being effective for musculoskeletal complaints. Respondents who would not consider future chiropractic care shared a common set of beliefs related to training of chiropractors, scope of chiropractic practice, and safety and reputation of chiropractic. These respondents reported increased likelihood of chiropractor use with the recommendation of a primary care physician.

CONCLUSION: Recruiting survey participants using MTurk is feasible, affordable, and quick and offers high utility to academic researchers. Using this resource, we ascertained preliminary data about attitudes and perceptions from individuals who would or would not consider chiropractic, stratified by their previous use.

Author keywords: Chiropractic, Manipulation, Spinal, Surveys and Questionnaires, Attitude, Adult, United States

Author affiliations: JW: College of Chiropractic, Cleveland University Kansas City, Overland Park, Kansas; RJW: Research Department, Cleveland University Kansas City, Overland Park, Kansas; RS: Cleveland University Kansas City, Overland Park, Kansas; WPM: Private Practice, Charleston, West Virginia; MTP: Research Department, Cleveland University Kansas City, Overland Park, Kansas

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