Researcher-participant Relationship Research Articles

The narrative research trail: values of ambiguity and relationships

Engle Angela Chan sets out the experiential function of ambiguity in nursing research through a narrative study of Canadian college nurse educators. Through the methods of conversation, journal writing and participation observation, the author, who was also one of the participants, explored with her colleagues the impact of nursing education and healthcare changes on their teaching lives. The article examines how researcher-participant relationships illuminate research outcomes.

Tapping the Perspectives of Children

The unique ethical issues related to conducting research with children are insufficiently distinguished from issues in working with vulnerable groups, despite a shift to recognizing children as active in the research process. Qualitative researchers are challenged to consider complex ethical issues related to children and are obligated to protect their rights, freedoms, safety, and dignity. While some issues are similar to those in any research context, the nature of the researcher-participant relationship, and the unstructured nature of qualitative research methods, add a dimension of risk. This article examines ethical issues in qualitative research with children: (1) consent and assent; (2) the obligation to protect children from harm while respecting

Creating Knowledge Collaboratively with Female Sex Workers: Insights from a Qualitative, Feminist, and Participatory Study

This article reflexively engages substantive, epistemological, methodological, and ethical issues that surfaced during a feminist, qualitative, and participatory research project with 6 adult female sex workers in Seattle, Washington. Given the intersubjective researcher-participant relationship within participatory forms of inquiry, personal and professional roles and boundaries were often obscure, fluid, and minimally defined. Consequently, issues of power, those personal and institutional, facilitated intriguing tensions that captured this researcher's attention. Central to the issues explored in this article are significant tensions between collaborative, reflexive, community research and academic modes and structures. In-depth individual dialogue sessions provided opportunities to both explore and create knowledge collaboratively with sex workers about their experiences from their perspectives. A spontaneous interpretive focus group created an opportunity for the participants, working in diverse arenas of the sex industry, to meet and exchange thoughts, feelings, and experiences, as well as inform the inquiry process and the authenticity of the findings.

The Participant as Transcriptionist: Methodological Advantages of a Collaborative and Inclusive Research Practice

This article documents an innovative approach to interview-based research known as the participant-as-transcriptionist method. In the participant-as-transcriptionist method, the participant serves as the transcriptionist, with editorial control to create the transcript from an interview. In the article, we address three key methodological advantages of the participant-as-transcriptionist method. First, the participant-as-transcriptionist method is inclusive for a range of researchers, disabled or otherwise. Second, the participant-as-transcriptionist method can incorporate a sense of collaboration in the researcher-participant relationship. Third, participant-transcriptionists can create quality transcripts that represent the participant's voice. Throughout the discussion, we interweave quotes from fieldnotes taken by the interviewer (the first author) and a participant-transcriptionist (the second author) as they describe their experiences using the participant-as-transcriptionist method in a research study.

Ethical considerations in international nursing research: a report from the International Centre for Nursing Ethics.

Ethical issues in international nursing research are identified and the perspectives o International Centre for Nursing Ethics are offered in an effort to develop an international consensus of ethical behaviour in research. First, theoretical issues are reviewed, then initial conditions for ethical conduct are defined, and protocol design and procedure considerations are examined. A concerted effort is made to identify and avoid a western bias. Broad guiding principles for designing and reviewing research are offered: (1) respect for persons; (2) beneficence; (3) justice; (4) respect for community; and (5) contextual caring. A collaborative model of the researcher-participant relationship is suggested and discussed.

Issues of Validity in Intercultural Professional Communication Research

This article explores three ways to design US empirical methods to be more valid and ethical in cross-cultural studies. First, intercultural researchers need to distinguish broad rhetorical and cultural patterns from regional, organizational, and personal patterns, a process that requires balancing the fact of difference with the need for generalization. Second, US researchers need to distinguish not only the differences in rhetorical patterns in a form of communication but also in the ways that form is used rhetorically. Third, researchers need to construct researcher-participant relationships that are sensitive to the values of organizational relationships in both cultures.

More Than Epistemology: Relationships in Applied Research With Underserved Communities

The nature and consequences of researcher‐participant relationships are explored within methodological frameworks, and the impact of relationship roles and decisions are examined through an example of applied research with low‐income women and an agency that serves them. Three types of relationship issues and decisions are discussed: (1) the construction of research relationships with two groups of participants: agency staff and agency clients; (2) the involvement of multiple researchers; and (3) the definition and boundaries of the research relationships pertinent to work with people and communities with limited resources. Researcher‐participant relationship dilemmas and decisions have implications for the quality of our research and the lives of our participants.

From the Field to the Courthouse: Should Social Science Research Be Privileged?

Social scientists need clarification about the extent to which the confidential aspects of their research are protected from compulsory disclosure in legal proceedings, and the extent to which they ought to be. Investigating the nature of social science research with an emphasis on researcher-participant relationships in ethnographic practice, I conclude that a qualified privilege would confer three major benefits on social science researchers: confidence that the government will not unnecessarily interfere with research, facilitation of improved researcher-participant relationships, and increased accuracy, thoroughness, and reliability of research data. I also discuss the development of privilege and confidentiality issues in practical research contexts through an examination of two criminal cases in which social science researchers refused to divulge the confidential information obtained in the course of research. Finally, I discuss the possible formulations of a scholarly research privilege. This is especially important because courts have cast social scientists as members of the larger community of academic or scholarly researchers with respect to these issues. Potential sources of protection include state journalist protection laws, federal common law, and federal statutory law. Evaluation of these sources and the case law to which they correspond suggests that developing common law privileges in state and federal jurisprudence is the most promising means of affording the confidential aspects of social science research legal protection. As researchers continue to press privilege issues in state and federal courts, these courts should recognize a qualified research privilege accordingly.

From the Field to the Courthouse: Should Social Science Research Be Privileged?

Social scientists need clarification about the extent to which the confidential aspects of their research are protected from compulsory disclosure in legal proceedings, and the extent to which they ought to be. Investigating the nature of social science research with an emphasis on researcher-participant relationships in ethnographic practice, I conclude that a qualified privilege would confer three major benefits on social science researchers: confidence that the government will not unnecessarily interfere with research, facilitation of improved researcher-participant relationships, and increased accuracy, thoroughness, and reliability of research data. I also discuss the development of privilege and confidentiality issues in practical research contexts through an examination of two criminal cases in which social science researchers refused to divulge the confidential information obtained in the course of research. Finally, I discuss the possible formulations of a scholarly research privilege. This is especially important because courts have cast social scientists as members of the larger community of academic or scholarly researchers with respect to these issues. Potential sources of protection include state journalist protection laws, federal common law, and federal statutory law. Evaluation of these sources and the case law to which they correspond suggests that developing common law privileges in state and federal jurisprudence is the most promising means of affording the confidential aspects of social science research legal protection. As researchers continue to press privilege issues in state and federal courts, these courts should recognize a qualified research privilege accordingly.

The Challenge of Multiple Roles in the Qualitative Clinician Researcher-Participant Client Relationship

Fundamental to obtaining data for qualitatie, fleld-based studies is the relationship between researcher and participant. Although sociological, anthropological, and feminist perspectives have identified some of the concerns that arise when relationships develop in the context of research, the health sciences literature provides limited information for clinicians as researchers, particularly in home settings. This article discusses the multidimensional relationships that developed between researcher and participants during an exploratory study of enrichment processes in family caregiving to frail elders. The data collection processes of intensive interviews and observations revealed the following unintended relationships: stranger-stranger, friend-friend, nurse-client, and guest-host. Suggested are topics for additional discussion regarding the experience of researcher-participant relationships in the home setting.

Researcher-participant relationships in journal reports on gay men and lesbian women.

To assess the ethical nature of research relationships between investigators and gay and lesbian participants we reviewed 351 reports on homosexuality in three major and 75 miscellaneous journals from 1974 to 1988. We found that authors rarely involved participants beyond the role of providing data, generally did not report conditions of consent, rarely reported feedback, and almost never indicated using data to promote social action. In addition, authors typically relied on the term "subjects" and on a depersonalized, decontextualized writing style. There were some differences among journals, over time, and among authors' disciplines. Male authors tended to study men exclusively, whereas female authors' relation to participants' gender was more varied. Believing that research with gay men and lesbian women should not detract from their emancipation, we offer some recommendations for research practice and report-writing which are designed to better protect research participants and to produce more valid knowledge.

A continuum of researcher-participant relationships: an analysis and critique.

In this article, three nursing research studies are analyzed by focusing on the nature of the researcher-participant relationship. This analysis is rooted in the assumptions, goals, and language of "new paradigm" research. The importance of making the researcher-participant relationship a central focus of nursing inquiry is addressed.

How Do You Like Me Now?: Exploring Subjectivities and Home/Field Boundaries in Research with Women in Sex Work

Anthropological analyses of blurred researcher–participant relationships and fieldwork boundaries in settings that double as the field and the researcher's home typically focus on the anthropologist's experiences, to the exclusion of how participants construct their own subjectivities in these fluid field sites. Using ethnographic vignettes from our research with women in sex work conducted in the neighbourhoods and services provision sites where we live and work, this article introduces the concept of “subjectivity work” as a means of exploring how we, alongside our participants, reconfigured our relationships to each other and the shifting boundaries of the field.