Participatory Research

Our approach to participatory research

At its heart, participatory research is about giving those affected by an issue a meaningful voice and a leading role in solution-building. It is an inclusive, collaborative approach to research that is rooted in the principles of justice and democracy and the idea that ‘Nothing about us, without us, is for us’ (James Charlton).

It is a shift away from a purely extractive research experience to one that strives to treat participants as true partners in the process.  We find that power imbalances are embedded in some traditional approaches to market research. For example, keeping objectives shrouded in secrecy creates the dynamic of an all-knowing moderator and an uninformed participant.

We appreciate that participatory research is not a new phenomenon. At Humankind Research we have moved from centring this approach on certain research topics, e.g., poverty, to making it a foundational principle for our research across the board. At a base level we are constantly thinking of how we can ensure the research experience is a positive and empowering one for participants. We see participatory research as both respectful and fruitful in that it leads to better engagement, which in turn creates the potential for richer insights. We also see the strong crossover participatory research has with wider principles of inclusive research - something we have championed since our genesis.

There are many ways we incorporate participatory design into our thinking, here are just a few...

• Conducting introductory calls with participants before the research begins to introduce ourselves and be transparent with them about the research objectives and process. This can also be an opportunity to get their thoughts on the proposed research approach, again, opening up spaces where those with lived experience have a hand in shaping the process
• Sharing a summary of findings with participants to give them a further opportunity to share their thoughts and play a leading role in shaping the research outputs – e.g. what they strongly agree with, anything they disagree with, anything they’d like to add
•  At the end of a research discussion, asking participants how they found the experience; anything that could have made it better or more comfortable; any questions that felt difficult to answer or topics that felt difficult to talk about. We then incorporate this feedback into future conversations with participants

What excites us most is the feedback from our participants: not just that the research experience has been a positive one, but in some cases even life-changing. People who have not been consulted or listened to before suddenly have a voice and the platform to use it.