Child-researcher relationships in child protection research. An integrative review

Abstract

ABSTRACT In research with children, particularly those in contact with social and health services, researchers face ethical challenges and have stringent ethical obligations. One obligation regards the need for researchers to adopt a reflexive approach to considering how children’s perspectives and experiences are represented. In this paper, the nature of child-researcher relationships and researchers’ positions are examined to further understanding of how to account for the impact of contexts on meaning making in research with children. An integrative literature review of articles concerned with child protection identified a paucity of researcher accounts of reflexivity. The review articles containing reflections on the role of social positions and relationship are analysed using Pierre Bourdieu’s notions of epistemic reflexivity. Bourdieu conceives of research relationships as social relationships, where the personal history of the researched and researcher and their social positions affect research processes. Integration of Bourdieu’s theory with the strategies described in the identified articles provides a provisional four-dimensional approach to reflexivity, that researchers could usefully apply in future research. Further reflexivity in social-work research with children is called for, so that understanding of the possible dimensions of reflexivity are extended.