Research as an intervention: A case study on violence against children in Peru

CRFR co-director Dr Sarah Morton, and colleague Tabitha Casey, share some of their findings from the recently published report, which examined the impact of a research programme aiming to prevent violence against children in Peru.

---

Preventing violence against children is becoming more of a focus for policy makers, with the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals including targets that aim to eliminate violence everywhere. How governments can achieve this is not so straightforward, however.

In 2014, UNICEF Office of Research- Innocenti and partners launched the Multi-Country Study on the Drivers of Violence Affecting Children in order to help governments understand and address this issue. The Study focused on four countries – Italy, Zimbabwe, Viet Nam and Peru – and partnered with Dr Debi Fry, Moray House School of Education, and Young Lives, based at the University of Oxford. Two years later we undertook a joint impact assessment with UNICEF to examine the impact of this research programme in Peru.

Few impact evaluations are carried out in low-and-middle-income countries (LMIC), especially on violence prevention research. Our aim was to assess the outcomes of the Multi-Country Study in Peru and also to test the Research Contribution Framework (RCF) (Morton, 2015), developed to examine how research uptake and use ‘contributes’ to policy and practice change, in a LMIC.

The RCF requires key partners to agree the main mechanisms through which the research might impact on policy or practice, which are then tested, along with key risks and assumptions. We collated all existing evidence (e.g. media, downloads, email testimonial), assessed the gaps in evidence and then took a field trip to Peru to gather more material. In Peru we conducted a range of stakeholder interviews with government, academic and UNICEF partners to assess whether the Study contributed to changes in awareness, knowledge, skills, behaviour, policy and practice among key stakeholders.

The impact assessment found that the multi-partner, relationships-driven approach of the Multi-Country Study helped to maximise impact in Peru. It was also important that the Study was nationally-led: this made sure that the findings were specific to Peru, which was key, considering the country’s geographic diversity and multi-culturalism, and also helped ensure national ownership and data sovereignty.

By using this approach, the Multi-Country Study contributed to a number of policy and programme changes in Peru, including the passage of a law banning corporal punishment in all settings. By focusing on capacity-building and awareness raising activities, the Study also helped to give violence against children a higher political priority, and study partners are committed to keeping it on the political agenda.

Recommendations from the impact assessment include:

• Plan sufficient timing – as well as flexibility - into the research design in order to build effective, trusting partnerships.
• Define and support key actors to take knowledge-brokering roles in order to ensure clear communication and engagement among study partners in complex projects.
• Plan an impact strategy from the start. Strategies should address complexity from the beginning, and also identify key monitoring criteria as well as risks and assumptions.

The RCF used here could be used both as an evaluation method and a planning tool to develop an impact strategy. Through this impact assessment, we found that the framework is adaptable and effective in a LMIC, and could be used to assess research impact in other contexts.

---

For more on the Multi-Country Study on the Drivers of Violence Affecting Children, visit the study site at: https://www.unicef-irc.org/research/274/

More information about the Peru study can be found here (in Spanish): https://www.unicef.org/peru/spanish/resources_33614.html

Sarah Morton (2015) Progressing research impact assessment: A ‘contributions’ approach. Res Eval 2015; 24 (4): 405-419. doi: 10.1093/reseval/rvv016

Measuring the impact of the book-gifting programme Bookbug

Ahead of the 2017 Bookbug conference research fellow Emma Davidson shares a few findings from CRFR's Bookbug research.

---

Bookbug is the Scottish Book Trust’s Early Years programme, encouraging parents and children to share stories, songs and rhymes from birth. The Scottish Book Trust’s Early Years programme has gifted free bags of books and resources to children in Scotland for many years, and there are Bookbug Sessions taking place every day in Scotland’s libraries, nurseries, and early years centres.

Over the last two years CRFR has been investigating the impact of the Bookbug programme on parents, carers, children and early years professionals. Amongst other questions, we have been seeking to understand the impact Bookbug has had on attitudes to reading, and whether there is a link between the way Bookbug Bags are gifted and the impact it has on families.

One of the key principles of Bookbug is that is a universal programme. This means that Bookbug Bags are available for all families in Scotland, and that Bookbug Sessions are – without exception - free to attend.

The evidence from our study shows the importance of universal delivery. Bookbug, we found, can have a positive impact on all families: not just those who might be judged ‘in need’ should the programme be means tested. For many of the parents we spoke to – including those who already described themselves as placing a high value on reading – Bookbug played a key part in reminding them of the importance of reading and singing to their children, and prompting them to dedicate time to do this:

“I definitely do think that it’s made a difference, it’s made me make sure I set, you know, 10-15 minutes aside every day, to do that [reading] with him.” 

Moreover, parents described Bookbug as encouraging them to do this at an earlier age than they initially intended:

“I would have thought “oh, she’s too young”, so it prompted me to think “oh well if they’re giving it to me, she can’t be too young…These things are good to remind you to do it…like in theory I should know what I’m doing because this is number 2, but getting books does make you think ‘oh yeah, I should actually be reading to her and not just to her sister.” 

What is clear from the data is that we cannot make assumptions about who might benefit from Bookbug based on the number of children they have, their income, gender, ethnicity and so on. Regardless of these factors families spoke about the positive impact that book-sharing has had on bonding and attachment between themselves and their children and their child’s enthusiasm for books. At the same time, Bookbug Sessions enabled many families to form new social and support networks.

We look forward to sharing more findings from our Bookbug research with you over the forthcoming months - keep an eye on the Bookbug webpages for more information, or join the CRFR research network mailing list for updates about this and other ongoing projects.

Progressing research impact – a ‘contributions’ approach

Sarah Morton has been working in knowledge exchange since 2001 and has recently published a framework for assessing research impact based on contribution analysis. Here she talks about how her approach not only provide impact analysis, but helps improve knowledge exchange with a focus on making a difference for people and communities. http://rev.oxfordjournals.org/content/24/4/405

My interest in assessing research impact rose from working on getting evidence into action. With colleagues here at the Centre for Research on Families and Relationships (www.crfr.ac.uk) over the last 15 years I have explored how to make research accessible, useable and meaningful to those working with children and families, or making policy on their behalf. Knowing whether or not we were making any difference was a logical extension from that work.

We have a small team of KE professionals working closely with our research team at CRFR. We have worked around the knowledge exchange agenda through an artist in residence (Levehulme), a three year project working with the voluntary sector to try to close the knowledge to action gap, a six year contract working closely with analysts in the Scottish Government, a dissemination post attached to the Growing up in Scotland (http://growingupinscotland.org.uk/) study, as well as well-planned programmes of engagement and dissemination for each of our research projects. I became interested in impact assessment because I wanted to know more about if we were making a difference, and if so, in what ways.

But assessing the impact of research on policy and practice is not easy. Our approach at CRFR recognises that research users are not passive recipients of knowledge, but that they engage with research from their own perspective, and that complex relationships and networks of researchers and research users are often channels through which research is communicated, debated, utilised, reworked, reused and developed. To understand impact we need to consider changes in policy and practice, changes in people’s knowledge and understanding of an issue, as well as the broad range of potential areas of influence, all highly context dependent. All of these factors make understanding and assessing research impact difficult, as I discuss in more detail in my paper.

I was delighted to be introduced to Contribution Analysis by Erica Wimbush, then Head of Evaluation at NHS Health Scotland (http://www.healthscotland.com/), on a visiting scholarship to the University. Many things about it seemed to make sense for research impact:

• A focus on who is engaged and involved, in what ways, and the learning needed to underpin change.
• The concept of ‘contribution’ is more appropriate for research which cannot cause change on its own, but need to be facilitated by a receptive environment and the actions of change agents
• A way of linking activities to wider outcomes, with a focus on processes, to create a strong story of how impact occurs.

I used this approach to develop the Research Contribution Framework, within a study that looked at what research impact was and how it happened. (http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/tpp/ep/2015/00000011/00000001/art00004) Since developing it we used it in various ways, including with CRFR’s research, ESRC genomics investments, a participatory research programme at the University of Leicester (http://www.crfr.ac.uk/briefing-assessing-research-impact/), as the basis of a four star REF impact case study (http://impact.ref.ac.uk/CaseStudies/CaseStudy.aspx?Id=23984) and to plan impact for the ESRC/MOD Future Reserves Programmes (http://www.future-reserves-research.ac.uk/).

At is core the framework sets out a pathway to impact, assessing for risks and assumptions and gathering evidence to show that it is robust. It can be used to plan and assess knowledge exchange as you go, retrospectively to assess impact, or in combination. It is highly adaptable to different timescales and contexts. It works best as a tool for teams, ideally including research users, to plan and align activities that have the most chance of really making a difference to communities and people. At its most simple it breaks down impact into three processes:

• Research uptake: research users have engaged with research: they have read a briefing, attended a conference or seminar, were research partners, were involved in advising and shaping the research project in some way, or engaged in some other kind of activity which means they know the research exists.
• Research use: research users act upon research, discuss it, pass it on to others, adapt it to context, present findings, use it to inform policy, or practice developments.
• Research impact: changes in awareness, knowledge and understanding, ideas, attitudes and perceptions, and policy and practice as a result of research

By thinking through these processes, a pathway with potential measures can be set out:

So at CRFR we now work with research teams or advisory groups to set out this kind of pathway for all of our new projects. The more perspectives, views and knowledge about the context for impact the easier it is to explore. We use this framework to help plan our KE activities, and we track as we go, allowing us to assess effectiveness early on, and adapt when approaches don’t seem to be working. We can see the impact story unfold in different ways, and if unexpected impacts occur, incorporate these into our pathway. Some of the tools we use for doing that are on our website (http://www.crfr.ac.uk/using-research/knowledge-exchange-training-and-resources/).

This approach sets out a linear pathway to impact, but this does not imply that research uptake, use and impact happens in a linear way. There may be several threads running through an impact story at different timescales, and looping back and forth between the categories. This is discussed and set out in the paper in more detail.

What’s great about working in this way, is that it helps to focus on why carry out KE activities, who they will engage and how, what they need to do differently for change to occur. It can help identify partners and steer resources towards where they can be most effective. Most of all it is usually an enjoyable way of getting teams together to explore what difference they might make through research and knowledge exchange.

Journal Club: Is that clear?

Relevance, access, collaboration, timeliness – magic words in the world of knowledge exchange. They were also key factors, helpfully identified by Oliver et al in their systematic review of studies of barriers and facilitators in using evidence. Taking the lead from Research Impact’s Journal Club, the CRFR Knowledge Exchange reading group ‘Practice what you preach’ met to discuss the review and reflect on our own experience of working in the field of evidence-use. We have captured our thoughts here, with links to some examples.

 

Oliver, K., Innvar, S., Lorenc, T., Woodman, J and Thomas, T. (2014). A systematic review of barriers to and facilitators of the use of evidence by policymakers, BMC Health Services Research, 14:2

Stop talking about dissemination

• Is it time to move beyond the concept of dissemination[i]? Dissemination was a key term in many of the papers in this systematic review. Research needs to get out there, but this one-way concept isn’t going to achieve results in getting policy makers engaged with research. We, along with the rest of the academic community, talk more about engagement, impact, and collaboration. It is important to plan, from the outset, how different audiences will be able to access and use research.
• It is a shame that the report authors grouped ‘access to research’ with ‘dissemination’ in their factor analysis. They are two very distinct issues – does it mean access to primary research, and/or research being made accessible through translation? A breakdown of these terms would have provided a clearer understanding of the barriers and facilitators for policy-makers.

How clear is clear?

• It would have been helpful if the authors had unpacked what was meant by 'clarity of research findings' within the studies they analysed. Were they referring to research which was written clearly and easy to understand, or were they referring to research which had clear recommendations and proposals? Research rarely provides clear recommendations of potential actions even though that is often what policy-makers and practitioners want.
• Knowledge exchange and mobilisation work means working with the available evidence to help shape what might happen next. We explored this in our CRFR briefing ‘Claiming an evidence base for services and interventions’. We are constantly working in this terrain as knowledge brokers for example:
• Growing Up in Scotland (GUS) – practitioners often ask for more information about how to use study research findings in practice. 
• About Families project and Evidence Request Bank development project– we often explain that research doesn’t provide direct answers, it poses questions and helps service professionals reflect on practice and share understandings with colleagues
• So we need to separate out ideas of knowledge exchange and implementation, as Melanie Barwick, who is running a KE training course here in Edinburgh in May says:

  “Knowledge translation and implementation are complimentary but different constructs. Knowledge translation involves helping others to understand the evidence; implementation involves supporting them to make the changes needed to apply the evidence. Impact means capturing that people knew what to do with the knowledge you shared.”

What are people doing?

• We noted that most studies included in the review were based on researcher’s or policy-makers perceptions of evidence use. There is a big difference between what people think they or others do, and what those people actually do. Sarah Morton’s forthcoming publication in Evidence and Policy will explore exactly what research-users do to apply research to policy or practice.
• The research-policy gap still appears as a barrier to evidence use within this review. Lack of policymaker research skills was also highlighted as a barrier, and we wondered, given the sheer amount of policy-relevant research that is produced, whether these two factors were linked. The issue of a research skills gap in local policy-making has been highlighted elsewhere[ii].
• So does more need to be done to present research in formats that can be easily digested into the policy environment? We have been working on this…
• GUS briefing in partnership with the Scottish Childcare and Protection Network, ‘What can research do for you?’ 
• GUS Briefing from Scottish Government Community Regeneration and Tackling Poverty Learning Network Learning Point 50 ‘GUS: Using evidence in practice’
• GUS Briefing for the Improvement Service ‘Key Messages from Growing Up in Scotland – Briefing for elected members no.13’
• Evidence Request Bank and About Families project - produces and shares appraised summaries of evidence in direct response to practice needs.
• We facilitated a meeting with Scottish Government policy staff to help inform the development of the Parenting Strategy, highlighting research from several of our Directors.

Improving collaboration

• In our experience collaboration and access are closely linked. Close collaborations between policy-makers and researchers increases access to research surely?
• There is general recognition of the importance of relationships between policy and research sectors, and issues are now more about nurturing a collaborative approach where both parties are active participants.
• We were also pleased to see that comparing the previous review with this one, mistrust is less of an issue. It seems a success of those working within the broad knowledge exchange field that the various audiences are at least recognising the role each other plays.

Tactical evidence

• We noted that the article didn’t refer to tactical or political use of evidence; that is when evidence is used or presented in a certain way to provide a desired answer. We felt that it must have been mentioned in some of the research included in the review.

[i] http://www.jrf.org.uk/publications/promoting-change-through-research-impact-research-local-government  http://www.alliance4usefulevidence.org/publication/squaring-the-circle/
[ii] http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsocialsciences/2013/08/19/is-it-time-to-ban-the-term-dissemination/

Making more sense out of evidence-based practice

Evidence-based policy and practice and knowledge mobilisation are frequently used terms, but what are the key challenges in using research to develop and improve services for children and families? In this blog, CRFR Co-Director (Knowledge Exchange) Sarah Morton reflects on a recent talk at The Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work at the University of Toronto.

I was delighted to be asked to open up a discussion about what we mean by knowledge based approaches, what helps and hinders knowledge utilization, and what approaches we can take to enhance knowledge mobilisation in different policy and practice settings. 

I drew on my 12 years experiences of leading knowledge exchange at the Centre for Research on Families and Relationships (www.crfr.ac.uk) based at the University of Edinburgh, with partners across Scottish Universities. This built on my experience of working in voluntary and statutory sectors on family and relationship issues, and more recently my PhD looked at how research impact occurs, and how it can be assessed.[1] 

In the space of a blog there is perhaps room for three key messages from my talk:

• What do we mean by research-utilisation?
• What is evidence for service and practice?
• Key ways of improving research use

What do we mean by research utilisation?
We often think that using research means creating a policy or practice change based on research findings, but research can be used in many ways. Drawing on work by Nutley et al (2007) research might raise awareness of an issue, change people’s knowledge or understanding of an issue, challenge attitudes, perceptions or ideas – all of these are pre-requisites of policy or practice change.

What is evidence for service and practice?
I have become concerned recently that we are narrowing our definition of evidence-based practice to mean solely that we are using programmes based on randomised controlled trials (RCT’s), for example, parenting programmes. Whilst this kind of evidence-based practice has its place, it is also problematic. Usually the trials have taken place in different contexts and countries, and adopting them wholesale undermines the expertise of local practitioners and underplays the cultural differences between communities. Recent work with Evaluation Support Scotland (http://www.evaluationsupportscotland.org.uk/) set out a range of ways we can think about evidence-based practice and services.

A programme can be evidenced-based in various ways:

• Our evidence: We have run this programme before and collected evidence to show that it worked for this group.
• Similar organisation evidence: Another organisation like us has run this programme before and collected evidence to show it would work (although not experimentally tested it).
• Broad research evidence: We’ve reviewed the research base and found strong evidence from research that the approach we are taking can work for the client group we are working with
• ‘What works’ evidence: This approach has been subject to randomised control trials (RCT) and we believe that our client group and context are similar enough for the same approach to work here.
• Innovation in the evidence-gap: Where there is no clear and appropriate evidence of what works for a particular client group, a programme can contribute to the evidence by experimenting and evaluating an approach that looks like it might work (from the available evidence). 

A full version of this discussion is available here: http://www.crfr.ac.uk/assets/CRFR_ESS_IS_Evidence_base_briefing.pdf

Key ways of improving research use.
There is well documented discussion of the key challenges for research use (e.g. Walter et al 2003). In order to improve the way that research links with policy and practice we need:

1. Translation – research in easily accessible forms for all those who might use it (this might be different for different groups).
2. Networks of relationships between researchers, policy-makers and practitioners to ensure that research is discussed, new research agendas have joint ownership and the possibility for close partnerships throughout the research cycle[2].
3. Learning organisations with strong leadership that recognise and understand new knowledge, assimilate and combine it with existing knowledge and translate knowledge into actions that will benefit the organisation[3].

We have a long way to go to develop these new ways of working that will enable researcher, policy-makers and practitioners to close the gap between knowledge and action. Organisations like The Factor—Inwentash Faculty of Social Work and CRFR are important in leading the way.

Dr Sarah Morton, BA, MSc, MSc.
Co-Director of the Centre for Research on Families and Relationships at the University of Edinburgh. Knowledge Exchange Specialist to the Scottish School of Public Health Research. Associate of the Research Unit for Research Utilisation (St Andrew’s University), and the National (UK) Coordinating Centre for Public Engagement. 

[1] Morton (fasttrack 2014) Creating research impact: the roles of research-users in interactive research mobilization. Evidence and Policy
[2] Best and Holmes(2010): Systems thinking for Knowledge to Action. Evidence and Policy May
[3] Harvey, G., et al. (2010). Absorptive Capacity: how organisations assimilate and apply knowledge to improve performance. Connecting knowledge and performance in public services : from knowing to doing. K. Walshe, G. Harvey and P. Jas. (eds) Cambridge University Press. 

   

 

Getting the Word Out: A Journey in the Science and Practice of Bringing Evidence to Application and Impact

CRFR is delighted to welcome Melanie Barwick to Scotland in May to deliver the extremely successful Knowledge Exchange: Concept + Planning + Evaluation = Impact Workshop. Here, Melanie gives an insight into what will be discussed and practiced during the workshop, and what has motivated her professional career over the last decade.

Early in my career, I set out to become a child psychologist and researcher in child and youth mental health, and I did. Along the way, serendipitously, I fell into the world of knowledge translation/knowledge exchange when I took on the leadership of Ontario’s outcome measurement initiative in 2000. Together with my team, we set out to train child and youth mental health practitioners in 120 provider organizations to use a level of functioning measure called the CAFAS, thereby creating a common metric for functioning across the province’s system of care. We were naïve, approaching the task with one-off training workshops to convey the rationale, knowledge of the CAFAS tool, and support practitioners to achieve rater reliability and to consequently use the tool in their practice. I reiterate: we were naïve. Some months into the task the light bulb illuminated, and we realized that effective practice change required more than translating evidence-based practice in a traditional didactic manner; it required a different approach altogether.

The outcome measurement initiative is in its 14th and final year, and will metamorphose into other developments as the system enters into clinical transformation dictated by Ontario’s policy framework for child and youth mental health. During this time, I’ve been funded to study practice change in several studies, and have expanded my enquiry beyond child and youth mental health into education, health, and global health. This rich and contextual research program has taught me a lot along the way, about practice change, implementation, and knowledge translation.

In a nutshell, this is what I now know.

Knowledge translation and implementation are complimentary but different constructs. Knowledge translation involves helping others to understand the evidence; implementation involves supporting them to make the changes needed to apply the evidence. Impact means capturing that people knew what to do with the knowledge you shared.

Practice change is not one-off. It’s a complex process that has many moving parts, some of which are likely universal but some that are unique to the particular context, and we are still learning what those are. There is alchemy in the practice change recipe. Every context calls for different amounts of the more universal ingredients, and a dash or two or other key elements that are necessary for that particular context. The practice change recipe for child and youth mental health, for health, or education will (I hypothesize) look different from one another.

Practice change calls for structure and an approach that is both adaptive and incremental. There is a method to the madness, and the application of good project management combined with the application of implementation teams, stages, drivers, and cycles will lead to more effective implementation, whatever the context.

The road to practice change – the implementation journey – has far better signage and lighting than it did 14 years ago. As implementation frameworks and theories become more refined, we are digging below the surface of categorical frameworks to identify the ‘what’ and the ‘how’ of changing practice. It is no longer sufficient to direct implementers to identify barriers and facilitators, tailor interventions to populations, facilitate the change endeavor, and measure outcomes without specifying how they are to accomplish these things. We are beginning to identify key factors that are implicated in effective implementation of evidence in practice across different sectors, and we are focusing on how to measure these key elements in a standardized way so that a common story can be told across case studies and contexts. Lastly, there is a growing library of openly accessible resources to help practitioners map their own implementation journey. Researchers are endeavoring to produce both scientific outputs whilst also developing resources and tools that can be of real and practical use in the field. It has never been a more fascinating and illuminating time, and the journey continues.

Contact:
Melanie Barwick, PhD, CPsych
Senior Associate Scientist
Community Health Systems Resource Group, Psychiatry
Child Health Evaluative Sciences, Research Institute
The Hospital for Sick Children
Associate Professor, Departments of Psychiatry and Dalla Lana School of Public Health
University of Toronto

Developing evidence into action

Our About Families project has developed an innovative 'evidence to action' process which supports voluntary and statutory organisations to use research when they are developing services. Topics are selected with project partners, based on the challenges facing the parents they work with. We gather and present the evidence and then work with the organisations to create and implement action plans to develop services based on this evidence. The involvement of service users is a central element to this approach.

Key findings from our reports have been published in previous blogs (Is Scotland the best place to bring up children; Two-thirds of families worse off compared to last year) and are available from our website (www.aboutfamilies.org.uk), but as we progress we wanted to share some examples of what we and our partners have achieved during the 'action' phase.

The About Families evidence topics:

• Parenting teenagers: relationships and behaviour
• Together and apart: supporting families through change
• Parenting on a low income
• Parenting and support (to be published end October 2012)

Heart to Heart
Heart to Heart provide confidential support to men and women who have been affected by divorce or separation. About Families worked with Heart to Heart to help them develop services which were more responsive to the needs of parents who have experienced relationship difficulties. We worked specifically on developing a toolkit which volunteers and staff at Heart to Heart will use to support parents. Together, we developed an online survey to gain more understanding about the views and experiences of parents and held a focus group with parents who had used Heart to Heart services. We took the key themes which came out of this work, issues such as anger, communication, forgiveness, anxiety and looking forward, to link them to the key findings from 'Together and Apart: Supporting families through change', within the toolkit.

Mentor
Mentor provides support to kinship carers and their families in Edinburgh and the Lothians. About Families worked with Mentor UK to explore how the evidence from 'Parenting teenagers: relationships and behaviour' and from 'Together and apart: supporting families through change' related to kinship care families. We discussed the key findings with families to learn how they relate to their experiences, and to explore coping strategies. A booklet was produced - each section within the booklet is based on research findings and explores the findings in relation to kinship care, as well as giving example coping strategies for Mentor volunteers to share with the families they work with.

Scottish Book Trust
The Scottish Book Trust early years programme delivers 'Bookbug', Scotland's national book gifting programme. The Trust is currently rolling out an assertive outreach programme to reach vulnerable children and families and those living in the most deprived communities across Scotland. About Families worked with Scottish Book Trust and You First to explore how evidence from 'Parenting on a low income' could help develop training for practitioners working with vulnerable families. Young parents were asked to reflect on Bookbug, as well as to talk about some of the key findings from the report. They discussed issues such as, the lack of choice facing families living on a low income; stigmatisation; the practical difficulties in accessing services; not knowing what is available or what to ask for; being labelled as inadequate parents. As a result of considering these issues and finding out the views of young parents, the Scottish Book Trust has developed the training they give to professionals working in local communities.

For more information on the About Families project please contact Karen Mountney, k.mountney@ed.ac.uk 

Recording research impact

Like many of our partners and colleagues we sit within an institution churning out research every day. But what happens to the research once we have published it, shared it and talked about it? Following on from our blog from Sarah Morton earlier this month, we thought it would be good to demonstrate one way of capturing impact.

We are fortunate at CRFR to have dedicated knowledge exchange staff: events management staff, communications specialists, graphic designers, dissemination officers and development officers. We work together to disseminate findings and to work with policy makers and organisations to influence services and policies.

Lesley Kelly, Dissemination Officer for the Growing up in Scotland study, and Dawn Cattanach, CRFR Graphic Designer, recently produced this video asking people why they are interested in GUS findings, how they use them, and what impact the evidence has on their work.

Click on the link to view the GUS video: http://vimeo.com/46680710

We regularly post new findings from the Growing Up in Scotland study. See posts on children at age 6, how parents are parenting, and a summary of evidence presented to Scottish Parliament.  Researchers working on GUS are currently analysing data from the most recent group of 'GUS babies'  (born 2010/11). The data from this group can be compared with data from children born 2004/5, to determine if there are any changes in outcomes for the two birth groups and to examine whether these changes may be related to changes in policy & service provision. Reports are not due until next year, but they are eagerly awaited and we will post findings on this blog and on the GUS website once published.

CRFR offer consultancy in research dissemination and event management. For more information please contact Vivien Smith.

Universities creating impact: the next five years

It may not be visible from outside, but currently UK universities are in a frenzy of activity to demonstrate the impact their work has had on non-academic audiences as part of the Research Excellence Framework (REF). The REF is a 5 yearly exercise that monitors and rewards the quality of research, and includes a measure of non-academic impact for the first time in the current round. This has created a much higher level of interest in how universities engage with communities, decision makers and others outside the institution.

I was recently asked to think about how universities might embed research impact over the next five years.  I started by thinking about what CRFR has been able to achieve over ten years (See KE at CRFR, Past present future), and what I observe in other parts of the university. There were two key building blocks in CRFR’s success in engaging with non-academic audiences and undertaking knowledge exchange activities (KE):

1)      Commitment and leadership: The original Directors of CRFR were committed to KE and provided leadership within the Centre that valued engaging with a range of non-academics, acknowledging that this could increase the quality of research. There was an underlying commitment that it was the right thing to do, an openness to trying new approaches, and a willingness to put potential academic barriers to one side

2)      Support: There was recognition of the limitation of their expertise, and the need for skilled support staff who understood the needs of the external stakeholders and who had events management experience. This raised CRFR’s engagement activities to a highly professional level – making for a better experience for those who come along to events. There was also a commitment to funding and supporting KE professionals in these roles.

So how do we create a culture where activities aimed at ensuring research impact are embedded into the way universities do things? We are not alone in considering this question. The National Coordinating Centre for Public Engagement (NCCPE) has been tasked with embedding culture change across universities and has developed some tools to assist with this process. Their tool ‘the edge’  suggests universities need to consider a range of questions about purpose, people and process. I have picked up on some of these here.

Where is the leadership in developing an institutional approach to ensuring research impact?

In my opinion leadership is still lacking and a lot of the best knowledge exchange activity occurs on the fringes of universities, passing under the radar of the institutions. There is a gender issue here too, with the majority of KE roles being filled by women, and the majority of leadership roles within universities by men. Rewards and promotions are slow to catch up with the impact agenda, with traditional academic activities still holding the higher status.

What are the community needs and how do we assess them?

Recently I have been fortunate enough to develop links with the Knowledge Mobilization unit at York University, Toronto. Their outward focus includes a helpdesk and helpline asking the local community ‘what do you want from our university?’ I find it hard to imagine a traditional UK research-led university being this open. Thinking more strategically about what external stakeholders might want requires a rethink about what a university is for. If we want research to have an impact we really need to understand better the issues facing our communities, practitioners and policy-makers.

What is the role of students?

Students, both undergraduate and postgraduate often have a huge interest in how their research is relevant to the wider world. Some overseas universities, particularly in the US send thousands of students to engage with local community groups, particularly around small projects sometimes linked to dissertations. I have some reservations about the ethics of such programmes, but I think it is important to consider the role of students in engaging with non-academic stakeholders and the huge potential that they represent

What can researchers get involved in rather than having to initiate themselves?

There is a lot of concern about the reinvention of the wheel. How can we embed processes of knowledge exchange so that researchers can link with skilled professionals to develop the highest standard of activities? The reputation of the university rides on this engagement, and there is a need to build on the goodwill of non-academic stakeholders to develop this agenda. If people come along to something which is boring, or not well designed, or which ignores their needs (and I have been to a lot of these!) then will they ever want to engage again? There is a need for learning communities, such as CRFR’s newly initiated KE Community of Practice, to allow supported experimentation as this agenda develops.

What recognition is there?

The REF is highlighting some of the excellent and exciting activity that staff within universities are engaged with that was previously less visible. The need for rewards and recognition for engagement activities seems clear, but is slow to develop within university systems. For example, how about including the opinions of external stakeholders in promotion panels?

How will this be coordinated?

Universities tend to be hugely bureaucratic with systems for teaching, research and support which have developed over many years. This is yet to be replicated in terms of the diverse activities that create research impact across an institution. We need better systems for coordinating engagement activities, but these need to be flexible enough not to stifle the creativity and responsiveness that is at the core of good quality engagement between academics and others.

So how do we create a culture where activities aimed at ensuring research impact are embedded into the way we do things? As the NCCPE acknowledge, culture change is hard. There is a need for training in communication, creating and evaluating impact, and the development of standards of practice that raise the game. Enthusiastic researchers who want to engage can still be stifled by line managers who are wedded to an older model of academia, so we need to build mentoring capacity and learning communities to bypass those who will never be interested in this agenda. We need to build an experimentation, learning, evaluation and sharing cycle which will help to ensure the quality of this emerging area. My own work using contribution analysis to assess impact is one way of starting to do this.

Lets hope that the legacy of the Research Excellence Framework 2014 will be that university research is no longer seen as an isolated intellectual activity, but one that is enriched by wider engagement with experts from the public, communities, policy and practice. Looking to the next five years can help universities include research impact as a key component of their business.

Sarah Morton

Co-Director, Knowledge Exchange