Participatory Research

Participatory research aspires to an ethical ideal in dealings with research participants:

"Participatory approaches to inquiry share an ideal of research as a democratic negotiated process between academic and community partners to ensure that the research process balances social and cultural relevance with scientific rigor fosters empowerment, ownership and capacity building and translates scientific knowledge into action. The ideal of shared decision making provides a starting point for academic and community partners to negotiate their levels of participation and establish decision-making mechanisms that allow for the integration of community members’ knowledge of local culture and context with researchers’ theoretical and methodological knowledge.” (Cargo et al., 2008: 904-905)

Cargo, M., Delormier, T., Lévesque, L., Horn-Miller, K., McComber, A., & Macaulay, A. C. (2008). Can the democratic ideal of participatory research be achieved? An inside look at an academic-indigenous community partnership. Health Education Research, 23(5), 904-914. doi: 10.1093/her/cym077

Cargo and colleagues point out how in practice such ideas may be difficult to achieve, for example in working with indigenous populations where they may be built in power inequities. They suggest that in practice there are different levels of participation in research: “Participatory approaches to inquiry support a spectrum of participation. Minimum participation denotes the participation of community stakeholders in the development of research questions and interpretation and application of research results while maximum participation occurs when those affected by the issue remain actively involved in all research phases...Models of community- controlled or -directed research, however, have not been formally entertained in participatory research despite the global movement of indigenous self-determination in Canada, the United States, Australia and New Zealand where the principles of ownership, control, access and possession of data collection processes are gaining in prominence." (Cargo et al., 2008: 904-905)

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