Creating research impact: the roles of research users in interactive research mobilisation (original) (raw)
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Evaluating Research Impact: The Development of a Research for Impact Tool
Frontiers in Public Health, 2016
introduction: This paper examines the process of developing a Research for Impact Tool in the contexts of general fiscal constraint, increased competition for funding, perennial concerns about the over-researching of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander issues without demonstrable benefits as well as conceptual and methodological difficulties of evaluating research impact. The aim is to highlight the challenges and opportunities involved in evaluating research impact to serve as resource for potential users of the research for impact tool and others interested in assessing the impact of research.
Open Research Europe, 2021
Effective research impact development is essential to address global challenges. This commentary highlights key issues facing research impact development as a nascent professional field of practice. We argue that those working on research impact should take a strategic, ‘evidence-based’ approach to maximize potential research benefits and minimize potential harms. We identify key features of evidence-based good practice in the context of research impact work. This includes integrating relevant research and theory into professional decision-making, drawing on a diversity of academic disciplines offering pertinent insights. Such an integration of scholarship and practice will improve the capacity of research impact work to make a positive difference for society. Moving the focus of research impact work to earlier stages in the research and innovation process through stakeholder engagement and anticipatory research can also boost its effectiveness. The research impact evidence base sho...
Emerald Open Research, 2019
Building on the concept of ‘impact literacy’ established in a previous paper from Bayley and Phipps, here we extend the principles of impact literacy in light of further insights into sector practice. More specifically, we focus on three additions needed in response to the sector-wide growth of impact: (1) differential levels of impact literacy; (2) institutional impact literacy and environment for impact; and (3) issues of ethics and values in research impact. This paper invites the sector to consider the relevance of all dimensions in establishing, maintaining and strengthening impact within the research landscape. We explore implications for individual professional development, institutional capacity building and ethical collaboration to maximise societal benefit.
SageOpen , 2014
U.K. policy is to embed “knowledge transfer as a permanent core activity in universities.” In this article, I propose an agenda for analyzing and informing the evolving practices of communicating university research insight across institutions, and for analyzing critically the ways in which “research impact” is being demanded, represented, and guided in current policy discourse. As an example, I analyze the U.K. Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) “Step-by-step guide to maximising impact,” using the concept of “recontextualization.” The analysis illustrates that the availability of relevant social science research does not ensure its use, even by the research funding council. It suggests that while a rationalist, common sense representation of communication may be functional in making research impact appear achievable within existing funding, it may be potentially counter-productive in terms of ensuring that research contributes to society. A recent project is cited to illustrate some of the intellectual challenges that are not indicated in the ESRC guide, and which demonstrate the value of social science insight.
Evaluating impact from research: A methodological framework
Research Policy, 2021
Background: Interest in impact evaluation has grown rapidly as research funders increasingly demand evidence that their investments lead to public benefits. Aims: This paper analyses literature to provide a new definition of research impact and impact evaluation, develops a typology of research impact evaluation designs, and proposes a methodological framework to guide evaluations of the significance and reach of impact that can be attributed to research. Method: An adapted Grounded Theory Analysis of research impact evaluation frameworks drawn from cross-disciplinary peer-reviewed and grey literature. Results: Recognizing the subjective nature of impacts as they are perceived by different groups in different times, places and cultures, we define research impact evaluation as the process of assessing the significance and reach of both positive and negative effects of research. Five types of impact evaluation design are identified encompassing a range of evaluation methods and approaches: i) experimental and statistical methods; ii) textual, oral and arts-based methods; iii) systems analysis methods; iv) indicator-based approaches; and v) evidence synthesis approaches. Our guidance enables impact evaluation design to be tailored to the aims and context of the evaluation, for example choosing a design to establish a body of research as a necessary (e.g. a significant contributing factor amongst many) or sufficient (e.g. sole, direct) cause of impact, and choosing the most appropriate evaluation design for the type of impact being evaluated. Conclusion: Using the proposed definitions, typology and methodological framework, researchers, funders and other stakeholders working across multiple disciplines can select a suitable evaluation design and methods to evidence the impact of research from any discipline.
Building the concept of research impact literacy
Evidence & Policy: A Journal of Research, Debate and Practice, 2017
Impact is an increasingly significant part of academia internationally, both in centralised assessment processes (for example, UK) and funder drives towards knowledge mobilisation (for example, Canada). However, narrowly focused measurement-centric approaches can encourage short-termism, and assessment paradigms can overlook the scale of effort needed to convert research into effect. With no ‘one size fits all’ template possible for impact, it is essential that the ability to comprehend and critically assess impact is strengthened within the research sector. In this paper we reflect on these challenges and offer the concept of impact literacy as a means to support impact at both individual and institutional levels. Opportunities to improve impact literacy are also discussed.
Assessing the Societal Impact of Research: The Relational Engagement Approach
Journal of Public Policy & Marketing, 2016
Marketing and policy researchers aiming to increase the societal impact of their scholarship should engage directly with relevant stakeholders. For maximum societal effect, this engagement needs to occur both within the research process and throughout the complex process of knowledge transfer. The authors propose that a relational engagement approach to research impact complements and builds on traditional approaches. Traditional approaches to impact employ bibliometric measures and focus on the creation and use of journal articles by scholarly audiences, an important but incomplete part of the academic process. The authors recommend expanding the strategies and measures of impact to include process assessments for specific stakeholders across the entire course of impact, from the creation, awareness, and use of knowledge to societal impact. This relational engagement approach involves the cocreation of research with audiences beyond academia. The authors hope to begin a dialogue on...
Public involvement in research: assessing impact through a realist evaluation
Health Services and Delivery Research Journal, Vol.2, Issue 36, 2014
BACKGROUND: This study was concerned with developing the evidence base for public involvement in research in health and social care. There now is significant support for public involvement within the National Institute for Health Research, and researchers applying for National Institute for Health Research grants are expected to involve the public. Despite this policy commitment, evidence for the benefits of public involvement in research remains limited. This study addressed this need through a realist evaluation. AIM AND OBJECTIVES: The aim was to identify the contextual factors and mechanisms that are regularly associated with effective public involvement in research. The objectives included identifying a sample of eight research projects and their desired outcomes of public involvement, tracking the impact of public involvement in these case studies, and comparing the associated contextual factors and mechanisms. DESIGN: The research design was based on the application of realist theory of evaluation, which argues that social programmes are driven by an underlying vision of change – a ‘programme theory’ of how the intervention is supposed to work. The role of the evaluator is to compare theory and practice. Impact can be understood by identifying regularities of context, mechanism and outcome. Thus the key question for the evaluator is ‘What works for whom in what circumstances . . . and why?’ (Pawson R. The Science of Evaluation. London: Sage; 2013). We therefore planned a realist evaluation based on qualitative case studies of public involvement in research. Setting and participants: Eight diverse case studies of research projects in health and social care took place over the calendar year 2012 with 88 interviews from 42 participants across the eight studies: researchers, research managers, third-sector partners and research partners (members of the public involved in research). RESULTS: Case study data supported the importance of some aspects of our theory of public involvement in research and led us to amend other elements. Public involvement was associated with improvements in research design and delivery, particularly recruitment strategies and materials, and data collection tools. This study identified the previously unrecognised importance of principal investigator leadership as a key contextual factor leading to the impact of public involvement; alternatively, public involvement might still be effective without principal investigator leadership where there is a wider culture of involvement. In terms of the mechanisms of involvement, allocating staff time to facilitate involvement appeared more important than formal budgeting. Another important new finding was that many research proposals significantly undercosted public involvement. Nurturing good interpersonal relationships was crucial to effective involvement. Payment for research partner time and formal training appeared more significant for some types of public involvement than others. Feedback to research partners on the value of their contribution was important in maintaining motivation and confidence. CONCLUSIONS: A revised theory of public involvement in research was developed and tested, which identifies key regularities of context, mechanism and outcome in how public involvement in research works. Implications for future research include the need to further explore how leadership on public involvement might be facilitated, methodological work on assessing impact and the development of economic analysis of involvement. FUNDING DETAILS: The National Institute for Health Research Health Service and Delivery programme.
Researchers’ perspective of real-world impact from UK public health research: A qualitative study
PLOS ONE
Research funded by the National Institute for Health Research Public Health Research Programme is being undertaken in a complex system which brings opportunities and challenges for researchers to maximise the impact of their research. This study seeks to better understand the facilitators, challenges and barriers to research impact and knowledge mobilisation from the perspective of UK public health researchers. A qualitative study using semi-structured interviews, informed by the Payback Framework, with public health researchers who held a research award with the National Institute for Health Research Public Health Research programme up to March 2017 was conducted. Following a thematic analysis, three strongly interlinked themes were extracted from the data and three key factors were highlighted as important for facilitating knowledge mobilisation and impact in UK public health research: (1) Public health researcher’s perception of the purpose of the research (2) Approaches to under...