Integrating Social Science and Design Inquiry Through Interdisciplinary Design Charrettes: An Approach to Participatory Community Problem Solving

Interdisciplinary collaborations that aim to facilitate meaningful community outcomes require both the right mix of disciplinary knowledge and effective community participation, which together can deepen collective knowledge and the capacity to take action. This article explores three interdisciplinary design charrettes, intensive participatory workshops that addressed specific community problems and provided a context for integrating design and social science inquiry with local community knowledge. Evaluation data from the charrettes shed light on how students from the design and social science disciplines experienced the charrettes, and on their interactions with community members. Key advantages to this interdisciplinary, community-based collaboration included expanded knowledge derived from the use of multiple modes of inquiry, particularly the resulting visualization tools that helped community members understand local issues and envision novel solutions. Key drawbacks included difficulties in balancing the two disciplines, the tendency for social scientists to feel out of place on designers' turf, and the increased disciplinary and interpersonal conflicts arising from a more diverse pool of participants.     

Building Interdisciplinary/Intersectoral Research Partnerships for Community-Based Mental Health Research with Older Minority Adults

Community-based research often brings investigators from different disciplinary backgrounds together with community representatives to conduct research on topics of mutual concern. This paper describes a case example that illustrates an interdisciplinary/intersectoral study of depression and barriers to mental health care among older adults and illustrate the factors central to implementing a successful research partnership. It will address the following conditions that facilitate and challenge interdisciplinary/intersectoral research: (1) achieving commonality of purpose in study design and research and referral approaches; (2) ensuring the ability to develop, field-test and implement psychometrically rigorous and culturally and qualitatively appropriate instruments; (3) building effective management structures for interdisciplinary/intersectoral research partnerships; and (4) identifying, training and supporting qualified researchers to carry out a mental health study with older ethnically diverse adults. The paper concludes with strengths and limitations of the approach.     

Reflecting on Participatory,Action‐Oriented Research Methods in Community Psychology: Progress,Problems, and Paths Forward

This paper provides a critical reflection on participatory action research (PAR) methods as they pertain to community psychology. Following a brief review of the fundamental aspects of PAR, key developments in the field are examined. These developments include the redefinition of the research enterprise among groups such as Indigenous and consumer/survivor communities, challenges that attend the “project” framing of PAR, academic and practice context challenges, and important domains in which PAR methods need to become more engaged (e.g., social media and disenfranchised youth). Three illustrative case studies of programs of work in the areas of youth homelessness, consumer/survivor engagement, and Indigenous research are provided to illustrate these contemporary challenges and opportunities in the field. The authors make the argument that without an effort to reconsider and redefine PAR, moving away from the stereotypical PAR “project” frame, these methods will continue to be poorly represented and underutilized in community psychology.     

Community Psychology at the Crossroads: Prospects for Interdisciplinary Research

Effective engagement in interdisciplinary work is critical if community psychology is to achieve its promise as a field of ecological inquiry and social action. The purpose of this paper and special issue is to help make the benefits of interdisciplinary community research clearer and to identify and begin to address its challenges. Although some areas of psychology (e.g., biological, cognitive and health) have made substantial interdisciplinary strides in recent decades, progress in community psychology (and related areas) is more modest. In this article we explore the prospects for expanding and improving interdisciplinary community research. Challenges include designs, measures, and analytical frameworks that integrate multiple levels of analysis from individuals through families, organizations, and communities to policy jurisdictions, and the complexities involved in simultaneously bringing together multiple disciplinary collaborators and community partners. Challenges to interdisciplinary collaboration common to all disciplines include the disciplinary nature of academic culture and reward structures, limited funding for interdisciplinary work and uncertainties related to professional identity and marketability. Overcoming these challenges requires a synergy among facilitative factors at the levels of the interdisciplinary project team (e.g., the framing question; embedded relationships; leadership), the investigators (e.g., commitment to new learning; time to invest), and the external context (e.g., physical, administrative, economic and intellectual resources and support for interdisciplinary work). We conclude by identifying several exemplars of effective interdisciplinary collaborations and concrete steps our field can take to enhance our development as a vibrant community-based, multilevel discipline increasingly devoted to interdisciplinary inquiry and action.     

Toward an Ethical Reflective Practice of a Theory in the Flesh: Embodied Subjectivities in a Youth Participatory Action Research Mural Project

The focus of this paper is to demonstrate how embodied subjectivities shape research experiences. Through an autoethnography of my involvement in a Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR) after‐school program with low‐income and working‐class youth of Color from predominantly Latinx communities I examined my embodied subjectivities, via an ethical reflective practice, as these surfaced in the research context. Autoethnography is presented as a tool to facilitate an ethical reflective practice that aligns with heart‐centered work. Drawing from an epistemology of a theory in the flesh (Anzaldúa & Moraga, 1981), embodied subjectivities are defined by the lived experiences felt and expressed through the body, identities, and positionalities of the researcher. The article concludes with implications for the development of community psychology competencies that attend to the researcher's embodied subjectivities.     

Photography and Social Media Use in Community‐Based Participatory Research with Youth: Ethical Considerations

Community‐based participatory researchers increasingly incorporate photography and social media into their work. Despite its relative infancy, social media has created a powerful network that allows individuals to convey messages quickly to a widespread audience. In addition to its potential benefits, the use of social media in research also carries risk, given the fast pace of exchanges, sharing of personal images and ideas in high accessibility, low privacy contexts and continually shifting options and upgrades. This article contributes to the literature examining ethical considerations for photography and social media use in community‐based participatory research. We describe three key ethical dilemmas that we encountered during our participatory photography project with Latina/o youth: (a) use and content of images and risk; (b) incentives and coercion; and (c) social media activity and confidentiality. We provide our responses to these challenges, contextualized in theory and practice, and share lessons learned. We raise the question of how to contend with cultural shifts in boundaries and privacy. We propose that evaluating participant vulnerability versus potential empowerment may be more fitting than the standard approach of assessing risks and benefits. Finally, we recommend upholding the principles of participatory research by co‐producing ethical practices with one's participants.     

Developing Measures of Community-Relevant Outcomes for Violence Prevention Programs: A Community-Based Participatory Research Approach to Measurement

Community-Based Participatory Research is a research paradigm that encourages community participation in designing and implementing evaluation research, though the actual outcome measures usually reflect the “external” academic researchers’ view of program effect and the policy-makers’ needs for decision-making. This paper describes a replicable process by which existing standardized psychometric scales commonly used in youth-related intervention programs were modified to measure indicators of program success defined by community partners. This study utilizes a secondary analysis of data gathered in the context of a community-based youth violence prevention program. Data were retooled into new measures developed using items from the Alabama Parenting Questionnaire, the Hare Area Specific Self-Esteem Scale, and the Youth Asset Survey. These measures evaluated two community-defined outcome indicators, “More Parental Involvement” and “Showing Kids Love.” Results showed that existing scale items can be re-organized to create measures of community-defined outcomes that are psychometrically reliable and valid. Results also show that the community definitions of parent or parenting caregivers exemplified by the two indicators are similar to how these constructs have been defined in previous research, but they are not synonymous. There are nuanced differences that are important and worthy of better understanding, in part through better measurement.     

Power and Action in Critical Theory Across Disciplines: Implications for Critical Community Psychology

Although critical scholarship and community psychology share similar aspirations, the links between them remain unexplored and under-theorized. In this article we explore the implications of critical scholarship in various specialties for the field of community psychology. To understand the contributions of critical scholarship to a theory of power and action for social change, we conducted a systematic analysis of a ten-year period of publications in seven journals associated with the critical scholarship tradition. We created precise criteria for the concepts of power and action and applied them to the publications. Results indicate an interesting paradox at play. Whereas community psychology is more action oriented than critical scholarship, its actions fall short of challenging institutionalized power structures and the status quo; and whereas critical scholarship is more challenging of the status quo than community psychology in theory, it has failed to produce viable actions that challenge the status quo. We discuss the implications of this state of affairs for the development of a more critical community psychology.     

Beyond Co-Existence to Mutual Influence: An Interdisciplinary Method for Psychoanalysis and Religion

As the disciplines of psychoanalysis and religion find themselves in a heightened cross-disciplinary context, issues of methodology remain at the forefront. This article constructs an interdisciplinary method based on the image of psychoanalysis and religion as neighbors who border along an “intimate edge”—a space of simultaneously overlapping, yet distinct concern. Using what is termed a “hermeneutic of mischievousness,” this method maintains an interpretive location for that which preserves, transgresses, and transcends the disciplinary boundaries. The article concludes with a brief application of the method to the relationship between the “analytic third” and Christian trinitarian theology.

Elucidating the Power in Empowerment and the Participation in Participatory Action Research: A Story About Research Team and Elementary School Change

Community psychologists are increasingly using Participatory Action Research (PAR) as a way to promote social justice by creating conditions that foster empowerment. Yet, little attention has been paid to the differences between the power structure that PAR advocates and the local community power structures. This paper seeks to evaluate the level of participation in a PAR project for multiple stakeholder groups, determine how PAR was adjusted to better fit community norms, and whether our research team was able to facilitate the emergence of PAR by adopting an approach that was relevant to the existing power relations. We conclude that power differences should not be seen as roadblocks to participation, but rather as moments of opportunity for the researchers to refine their methods and for the community and the community psychologist to challenge existing power structures.     

Using Community Surveys to Inform the Planning and Implementation of Environmental Change Strategies: Participatory Research in 12 Washington Communities

A number of studies have demonstrated the efficacy of environmental change strategies (ECS) in effecting community-level change on attitudes and behaviors related to underage drinking (Treno and Lee in Alcohol Res Health 26:35–40, 2002; Birckmayer et al. in J Drug Educ 34(2):121–153, 2004). Primary data collection to inform the design of these strategies, however, can be resource intensive and exceed the capacity of community stakeholders. This study describes the participatory planning and implementation of community-level surveys in 12 diverse communities in the state of Washington. These surveys were conducted through collaborations among community volunteers and evaluation experts assigned to each community. The surveys were driven by communities’ prevention planning needs and interests; constructed from collections of existing, field-tested items and scales; implemented by community members; analyzed by evaluation staff; and used in the design of ECS by community-level leaders and prevention practitioners. The communities varied in the content of their surveys, in their sampling approaches and in their data collection methods. Although these surveys were not conducted using traditional rigorous population survey methodology, they were done within limited resources, and the participatory nature of these activities strengthened the communities’ commitment to using their results in the planning of their environmental change strategies.     

People Awakening: Collaborative Research to Develop Cultural Strategies for Prevention in Community Intervention

The consequences of alcohol use disorder (AUD) and suicide create immense health disparities among Alaska Native people. The People Awakening project is a long-term collaboration between Alaska Native (AN) communities and university researchers seeking to foster health equity through development of positive solutions to these disparities. These efforts initiated a research relationship that identified individual, family, and community protective factors from AUD and suicide. AN co-researchers next expressed interest in translating these findings into intervention. This led to development of a strengths-based community intervention that is the focus of the special issue. The intervention builds these protective factors to prevent AUD and suicide risk within AN youth, and their families and communities. This review provides a critical examination of existing literature and a brief history of work leading to the intervention research. These work efforts portray a shared commitment of university researchers and community members to function as co-researchers, and to conduct research in accord with local Yup’ik cultural values. This imperative allowed the team to navigate several tensions we locate in a convergence of historical and contemporary ecological contextual factors inherent in AN tribal communities with countervailing constraints imposed by Western science.     

A Case Study of Participatory Action Research in a Public New England Middle School: Empowerment, Constraints and Challenges

PAR recognizes teachers and students as co-creators in a learning process that builds self-efficacy essential to long-term educational success. In enabling contexts, PAR projects also allow teachers to critically deconstruct societal power, examine how these dynamics are reproduced in the classroom, and work against the silencing of student voices. This case study describes the process of implementing an inquiry-based PAR model into a formal urban middle school program intended to reduce drop out rates. The anthropologist/researchers employed participant observation, interviews, and review of student work to explore the dynamics, challenges, and constraints confronted during the process. The intervention demonstrated the gap between practice and theory in a middle school environment marked by well-defined hierarchies and roles as well as high-stakes testing.