Overview
Once a participant has completed your study, it’s up to you, as the researcher, to review their data and decide whether the submission should be approved and paid, rejected and penalised, or returned.
See the Submission approval rules and timeframes article for more details on when you should pay a participant and how auto-approvals work.
Additionally, submissions completed in less than half of the estimated study time are flagged for manual review rather than being automatically approved. Researchers are responsible for reviewing these flagged submissions and deciding whether to approve them.
What are Prolific’s approval, rejection, and return guidelines?
At Prolific, we have specific criteria and guidelines for handling participant submissions, including when to approve, return, or reject them.
When should I approve a submission?
Participants should be approved and paid if they have completed your study and provided data, unless they meet specific rejection criteria.
See How do I pay participants? for guidance on how to approve and pay submissions.
When should I reject a submission?
On Prolific, you have the option to reject participant submissions if there are certain issues with the submission.
These issues can include:
Failed attention checks
Demonstrated low effort
Completed exceptionally fast
Failed authenticity checks
See Who should I reject? for a full list of valid and invalid reasons for rejecting a submission.
Please think carefully about whether the rejection is justified, and try to keep rejections to a minimum.
Participants are penalized for rejections, and if they receive too many, they will be removed from the platform entirely. Please review all submissions holistically and remember that participants have spent time and effort taking your study.
See How do I reject or return a submission? for guidance on how to reject a submission or request a return.
When should I ask a participant to return a submission?
When a submission is returned, that spot reopens in your study so another participant can take part and you can still collect all the data you need.
You may request that a participant return their submission if:
They only completed part of your study (and didn't finish it)
They encountered technical problems (in which case, please consider awarding partial payments)
They withdrew their consent (in which case, please also delete any data that you have from that participant in your external software)
They didn't match your specified prescreening criteria
They failed fair comprehension checks twice
They didn't complete all parts of a longitudinal / multi-part study (in which case, please consider awarding partial payments for the parts they completed)
They didn't attend a scheduled interview
They returned their submission due to technical problems with the study interface or related issues
They withdrew their consent during the study (their submission will be returned and their data must be deleted accordingly)
See How do I reject or return a submission? for guidance on requesting a return.
Understanding participant behavior (including why submissions are returned) can help you manage these situations more effectively.
Note: If you've requested a return and the participant has not done so within 2 days of the request, and you have a valid reason for requesting the return, please contact our Support Team with the study name or study ID, the list of Prolific IDs you want to return, and the reason for the request.