Understanding the Role of Community Peer Research Training in Creating New Knowledge Across Different Forms of Expertise: A Reflection on Methods

This paper considers the role and practice of training in community peer research projects. Community peer research aims to engage with and work across communities inside and outside of academia to co-develop research plans, activity, analysis and action. The role of training is recognised as important and yet detailed descriptions of content and methods are rarely shared. To address this, this paper shares my own practice and reflects on the wider literature to consider different approaches, methods, and assumptions. I consider how training engages with issues around power, knowledge construction and ethical practice to consider what ‘good’ looks like across the process. I suggest that greater attention should be paid to the development of methods and theories that underpin training in community peer research practice and call for methodological innovation and theoretical development of the role of community peer research training.