elizabeth Harris

United Kingdom

Reviews

Review of Prolific


Rated 1 out of 5 stars

Prolific users are disposable

I participated with Prolific for several months and completed over 1,000 studies. I found the platform engaging, with a wide range of interesting and enjoyable research opportunities. I was committed to being an honest and reliable participant and even received positive feedback from researchers during follow-up interviews.

Unfortunately, my account was suddenly placed under review without any explanation. Despite re-reading the guidelines and contacting support, I was never informed of the specific reason. I later discovered that certain apps, such as Nielsen or Apple’s iCloud Relay, can install VPN-like functions in the background, which may have triggered their systems. I disclosed this to Prolific and disabled them, but my account was ultimately closed permanently.

While I was able to withdraw my balance, the lack of transparency and finality of the decision was disappointing. Participants dedicate significant time and provide valuable data, but Prolific offers no clear appeals process or detailed feedback if issues arise.

Prolific can be an excellent platform when things run smoothly, but potential users should be aware that accounts may be closed without warning or explanation, and there is little recourse once that happens.

July 31, 2025
Unprompted review

Reply from Prolific

Hi there,
Thank you for your review and I am sorry to hear that you have not had a positive experience.
If your account was placed on hold, we want to assure you that we don’t take the decision to ban participants lightly. While we do carry out a variety of crucial automated checks, when you appeal a hold on your account, we take a careful, manual review of the account in order to come to a decision on the outcome.
One of our main goals as a research platform is to provide high data-quality standards for every single study that runs on Prolific, which is why we carry out automated checks on all participant accounts.
Once accounts are put on hold by our automated checks, our team is able to manually review them and reinstate accounts where applicable. If we are unable to do so, it is because you have failed one or more of our checks.
We are sorry not more can be done here!
Best wishes,
Prolific team

Review of Respondent


Rated 5 out of 5 stars

A great study site very interesting and fun

I really enjoy the surveys and studies on Respondent. There’s a good variety, and while I don’t always qualify for all of them, there are plenty that I do, which keeps it worthwhile and interesting. I wont get rich from the occasional study but its a nice addition every month.

October 2, 2025
Unprompted review