Citizens are increasingly expected to participate in health research development due to the benefits highlighted by funding bodies and policies. However, international studies have shown that citizens participating in health research may be more likely to come from privileged backgrounds, thereby questioning the inclusivity of the participatory agenda, describing indirectly dominating dispositions that enable middleclass citizens and health professionals occupying the healthcare sector to define the social requirement for participation. The lack of attention to intersectional (dis)advantages in Danish collaborative approaches can render the impact of class and gender invisible to health researchers, and thereby future health service research. This paper draws on 15 biographic narrative interviews, each 34 hours long with citizens, and observations from research panels conducted at two health institutions from one region in Denmark to construct analytically ideal types of citizens (i.e., the ‘deprivileged, mixed, and privileged’ habitus citizens) show different reasons for becoming involved. Research panels are spaces where citizens participate voluntarily for two years to influence health research and organizational development. The study found that a large majority of participants in the research panels were white, well-educated, middle-class, and connected to patient organizations. with a few workingclass participants. The paper describes the interviewees’ experiences and motivations for participation, and how the citizens' earlier experiences privileged their participation. The findings indicate a risk of marginalisation of disadvantaged citizens from being involved in health research that calls for caution about citizens' social position and dominating depositions in the spaces they participate in.
Jonas Thorborg Stage (Wed,) studied this question.