Written by: Brittany Burian, Marie Jozwiak, Barbara Blocki and Kerilynn Bath
What is Participatory Action Research?
Participatory Action Research (PAR) is an organized investigation of an identified problem or area of interest by those affected by the problem being studied with the ultimate goals of empowerment and achieving social change (Minkler. 2000). PAR contains the following properties:
The “issue” originates in the community or workplace itself;
Involves engaging and cooperating with community members alongside researches in which both parties contribute to the research equally and is co-learning for both the participants and researches alike;
Can be used for systems development and community capacity building;
Provides empowerment so that participants may improve and increase control over their lives and increases people’s awareness of their own capabilities; and
Research and action implemented together, using a balanced approach.
The focus of PAR is a response to issues that leads to a fight for change using community engagement as opposed to detachment and submissiveness, especially in groups or communities whose issues include inaccessibility; colonization; marginalization; exploitation; racism; sexism; cultural alienation; etc (Hagey. 1997).
According to Hagey (1997) there are 3 different scenarios in which PAR has been used successfully to invoke change among the involved community:
Technical and empirical knowledge and analytic techniques such as clean water systems; reforestation; sewer systems; reallocation of food sources; mapping of traditional hunting and trapping; and land use.
Dialogue and human interaction as seen in efforts to reduce police harassment in areas of high rates of sexual assault in a community, to a reduction of sexual assaults related to better police relations.
Social action, which uses both empirical and interpretive techniques to generate program development such as: Women’s health programs; street patrol assistance for homeless people; community kitchens for co-operative, affordable nutrition; and birth control programs.
Exploitation of PAR can occur when researches are unaware about the community’s history and unconscious to any oppression in the community that is occurring among the participants. As well, private researchers may present a preformed agenda meant to exploit the community for the betterment of a company, political powers or the researcher’s own invention (Hagey. 1997).
Hagey, R. S., (1997). Guest editorial: The use and abuse of participatory action research. Chronic Diseases in Canada, 18(1). http://www.phac-aspc.gc.ca/publicat/cdic-mcc/18-1/a_e.html
Minkler, M. (2000). Using participatory action research to build healthy communities. Public Health Reports, 115. 191-197. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/10968753/
What are the Pros And Cons of Participatory Action Research?
General guidelines for assessing if research is in good standing with academic requirements can be evaluated based on the following elements: Credibility, Audibility, and Fittingness. Credibility speaks the judgement of the participants and members of discipline of the information to be in line with the knowledge, and understanding of events. Audibility demonstrates the path of how the conclusions came to be. This should be transparent and clear as to how the findings informed the outcome. Fittingness is the element of how informative are the findings and how this supports the area of study. (Lobiondo-Wood, G. et al. , 2013).
Strengths
Strengths identified for participatory action research are found to be a way to conduct research for those who are typically unheard, marginalized or underrepresented in society. The process encourages collaboration, education, and empowerment (Kong et al., 2020). The experts in this process are identified as those who have lived experience and are able to bring deeper understand to issues. This would allow for more robust information and inform the findings on a deeper level. This approach also reduces the discipline focused language and improves understanding of the findings to those who are impacted therefore having more value (Bennett, 2020). Bennett claims in an aboriginal study this method serves the community in a positive light and improves trust and balances power between the community and the researcher. This supports the community to be able to resolve their issues from within and is in line with their cultural norms.
Weaknesses
Weakness with this approach is due to the one on one interactions and the interpretation of the findings. The participants need to have a broad view and limited biases otherwise the results will be skewed. Obtaining a true sample of the group is also difficult for these types of populations due to capacity to participate, time availability, true understanding of the work and resources. Marginalized communities may not have the time to volunteer for this type of study and complete their daily activities to earn money t o provide for their families limiting the number and compliment of participants (Bennett, 2020).
Validity Issues
Validity issues are identified as concerns with the understanding of participants, appropriate sample as representative of the group or community, understanding of what knowledge is, and autonomy (Kong et al., 2020). Disclosure upfront must be clear to the participants as this will impact who comes forward ultimately impacting the results(Bennett, 2020). Coding the data for this method requires very clear understanding of how this will be coded and applied consistently, interpretation of statements and experiences are at risk for bias and altered due to personal perceptions(Kong et al., 2020)
Assumptions
This method is designed to be done as a collaborative approach integrating the researcher into the population. This is very different from a researcher observing a population. The group is considered to be the holder of knowledge as opposed to external people identified as the experts. This method also depends on relationships from multiple parties to execute it correctly(Kong et al., 2020). The premise that the knowledge of the group or community is seen as expertise is valued and viewed as autonomy of the group to inform their own research and ultimately trust the findings (Bennett, 2020).
References
Bennett, M. (2020). A review of the literature on the benefits and drawbacks of participatory action research. First Peoples Child & Family Review, 1(1), 19–32. Retrieved October 15, 2020, fromhttps://doi.org/10.7202/1069582ar
Kong, S., Banks, S., Brandon, T., Chappell, S., Charnley, H., Hwang, S., Rudd, D., Shaw, S., Slatcher, S., & Ward, N. (2020). Extending voice and autonomy through participatory action research: Ethical and practical issues. Ethics and Social Welfare, 14(2), 220–229. Retrieved October 15, 2020, fromhttps://doi.org/10.1080/17496535.2020.1758413
Lobiondo-Wood, G., Haber, J., (2013) Chapter 18: Critiquing Qualitative Research. In Cameron, C. & Singh, M. D. (3rd Eds.), Nursing research in Canada: Methods, critical appraisal, and utilization (pp. 399-425). Elsevier
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