Imagining Participatory Action Research in Collaboration with Children: an Introduction

For decades, social science researchers have been studying programs, services, and settings that are explicitly designed to have an influence on children (e.g., mental health services for children, school classrooms, after school programs, families, neighborhoods). Researchers who are concerned with the contexts in which children develop, social issues that influence children, and/or social justice generally define and evaluate a problem related to these programs or settings, and sometimes create and assess an intervention. Consequently, these researchers are often the ones to determine the problem definition. Common definitions include poor developmental or educational outcomes, child abuse, child labor violations, and so forth. These problem definitions and subsequent conceptualizations then become part of a larger narrative about what or who needs fixing (Seidman and Rappaport 1986). Frequently, these problems are studied by collecting survey data from adults or by observing children. Generally, these measures and observational procedures are designed by adult researchers. In the field of community psychology, however, there has been a broad consensus that community members should also be involved in defining problems and solutions, as their participation improves the research and benefits the community. When thinking about issues that affect children, community psychologists have most frequently conceptualized important stakeholders as parents and extended family members, family advocates, teachers, mental health professionals, and other adults in children's lives. These adults may be consulted in interviews or focus groups, usually responding to the problem as conceptualized by the researcher. Increasingly, adult stakeholders and older youth may take on more participatory roles. Rarely, however, are children consulted or asked to help formulate the problem definition or proximate solution. Indeed, research is typically done for children, but not with children. This special issue is a collection of papers about participatory action research with children who are middle school age or younger, and is intended to stimulate dialogue and to offer alternatives when conducting research that affects children. Community psychology challenges us to create spaces where those who have structurally been denied a voice in democracy can begin to build power for civic engagement. This mandate is of utmost importance because if there is a group that is systematically excluded from civil society, then this structural exclusion tends to breed injustice. Historically, community psychologists have engaged specific populations that fit this description, including those labeled as seriously mentally ill (e.g., Fairweather et al. 1969). More recently, researchers have also worked with those who are or have been incarcerated (Fine et al. 2003), recent immigrants (Solis 2003; Suárez-Orozco 2000), those who are undocumented (Dominguez et al. 2009), and youth (Watts and Flanagan 2007). Children also fit this description. Children are often not consulted or even asked to participate in civil society, nor in research that is about their lives. These omissions are likely the consequences of researchers’ views of children, which are informed by societal beliefs. For example, dominant narratives in many societies hold that children are not able to participate in making important decisions that affect them. Yet an empowerment perspective demands that we question these dominant narratives and to seek out alternative stories that challenge assumptions about children's capacities (Rappaport 2000). This perspective enables us to imagine shifting roles and relationships, as well as the possibility of meaningful partnerships between adults and children. We may envision children as collaborative change agents in the settings and contexts of their lives. Developmental research supports this vision of children taking up more active roles in second order setting change, suggesting that children hold more complex cognitions than was earlier presumed (Kellett et al. 2004; Rogoff 2003). This research has generated a more multifaceted understanding of the active and ongoing transactions between individual children and their social worlds. Indeed, a sociocultural approach has directed attention to children's changing participation over time in the meaningful routine cultural practices of families, neighborhoods, schools, and other key settings in their lives (Rogoff 2003). Researchers studying the timing of children's acquisition of various skills and competencies have become more aware of great variation in different cultural communities. Adult goals and expectations, as well as routine activities to which children are exposed, influence the development of skills and competencies, such as being responsible for themselves or others, or participating as apprentices in a research team. Another growing area of research, known as the sociology of childhood or childhood studies, has also raised many questions about how children are viewed within many communities, especially Western societies. The critique offered within these perspectives is that childhood is socially and culturally constructed, and that the construction of “child as innocent” or “child as becoming” leaves children without a say in important matters affecting them (Durand and Lykes 2006; Kellett et al. 2004). Instead, the sociology of childhood perspective encourages us to listen to children's perspectives and view children as experts in their own lives. Children's expertise can be cultivated by teaching them specific skills. Participating in research, for example, can help them gain more control of the resources that affect their lives. Children, therefore, can become advocates for themselves and others. These sociocultural findings and childhood studies/sociology of childhood perspectives, when combined with other research that indicates the benefits of learning more from the community members being theorized, lay important groundwork for epistemological innovation, especially as it relates to how knowledge is generated and understood. Collaborative methodologies are consistent with community psychology values (e.g., collaboration, valuing human diversity, social justice) and theories (e.g., empowerment, civic participation). For example, research that has asked homeless people what services they need has resulted in a very different perspective and understanding compared with research that asks case workers about the needs of the homeless (Acosta and Toro 2000). Research dealing with children and their lives can similarly be transformed by embracing the role of children as social actors and collaborators/co-researchers. Research that affects children can be further reinvigorated by reconceptualizing the research process as an intervention in and of itself, where children learn skills through guided participation and active engagement. In other words, research and intervention are not separate steps, but rather are the components of praxis, or an embodied theory, with an agenda of creating conditions that facilitate individual and group empowerment, as well as social change. Using the theoretical framework of participatory action research with children has the potential to strengthen research findings, interventions, and social action. This special issue brings together an eclectic set of papers that engage children—from around the world, who are of middle school age and younger, and who are of different races, ethnicities and generally from financially poor communities—in a participatory action research (PAR) process. PAR is a theoretical standpoint and collaborative methodology that is designed to ensure a voice for those who are affected by a research project (Nelson et al. 1998). Cycles of a PAR project may engage participants in any or all of the following: helping to formulate the problem definition, assessing the problem, determining an intervention, implementing the intervention, and assessing the intervention. Multiple methods are often used with PAR, including surveys, focus groups, interviews, Photovoice projects, observations, and community mapping. Although PAR research has engaged adults and older youth in the process, very little PAR research, especially in the United States, has included the role of the child as social actor, collaborator, researcher and/or change agent. This state of affairs is problematic given that participatory action researchers and community psychologists argue that problem definitions and interventions are more valid and effective when all stakeholders are involved in the process. What happens when the people of concern are children? Are they afforded the same rights by society and by researchers? If researchers interested in empowerment are obligated to collaborate in communities in ways that enhance the power that people have over their own lives (Rappaport 1981), does this same obligation hold if our participants are children? This special issue addresses these questions as it tests and expands the theoretical underpinnings of empowerment and PAR by collaborating in an embodied theory with children. This compilation of articles is quite diverse in terms of the disciplinary backgrounds of the authors, as well as the countries and settings where the research takes place. In addition to academic contributors, there are practitioners (Chen et al. 2010; Maglajlic 2010; Newman Phillips et al. this issue; Porter et al. 2010) and a child (Patel, highlighted in Kellett 2010). Beyond psychology, primary authors are from anthropology (Newman Phillips et al. this issue), childhood studies (Clark 2010; Kellett 2010), social work (Maglajlic 2010), education (Van Sluys 2010), social studies (Ren and Langhout 2010), geography (Porter et al. 2010), and public health (Wong et al. 2010). Also, PAR is represented in many places around the world, allowing readers to examine how PAR is situated in and across several countries. Outside of the US, these places include Sub-Saharan Africa (Porter et al. 2010), Bosnia and Herzegovina (Maglajlic 2010), Canada (Liegghio et al. 2010), and the UK (Clark 2010; Kellett 2010). This diversity allows for rich comparisons with respect to methods, age of children, social and cultural contexts, and settings where the research is conducted. There are, of course, a number of ways that this special issue could have been organized. We chose to group the articles according to whether the primary focus was on theory and methods, school-based examples, or community-based examples. As we read through the articles, many issues arose across the three subsets of articles. We were particularly struck by the observation that, although all of the papers deal with children and PAR, the papers are positioned differently in terms of guiding paradigm and theoretical tradition when engaging children as collaborators. Given that many papers draw from multiple paradigms and theoretical traditions, our intention is not to sort papers into mutually exclusive groups, but rather to examine the papers along these two dimensions. The papers draw upon three broad guiding paradigms: post-positivism, social constructivism, and critical theory. This range of perspectives within the special issue is an important reminder that PAR can be a method choice and/or an epistemological choice. PAR as a method can be used, of course, with any paradigm because a method is simply a tool for collecting data. Where PAR is taken up by researchers primarily as a method choice, it is often used in conjunction with a post-positivist perspective. In these cases, the reason for using PAR is generally to increase the validity of data, often to provide evidence to support structural changes within specific settings. For example, in a multisite study reported by Chen and colleagues (2010), girls in five US cities served as evaluators of their after-school programs. The authors found that PAR is a promising evaluation tool; the girls determined what offerings worked well and what could be improved to make after-school programming more engaging for them. Additionally, staff learned that the girls were capable of engaging in research, which challenged their assumptions about the girls and had implications for future programming. Finally, the authors recommend that PAR practices be integrated in future program evaluation across the organization's many US sites as a way to improve data collection, showcase the skills and talents of the girls, and alter relationships between the girls and staff. In another large scale study discussed by Porter and colleagues (2010), children in Ghana, Malawi, and South Africa used a variety of methods, including interviewing and weighing carried loads, to learn from other children about their travel, transportation problems, and safety concerns. The long-term goal of the project was to improve children's safety as they travel from one place to the next. In both papers, some authors are a part of the community being studied. Yet, it is also the case that in both papers, the authors argue convincingly that children are able to collect better data because of where they are positioned (i.e., as insiders) and that children to the and of the research As an epistemological choice, PAR is most with social and critical theory. Indeed, with how we by definition, it the between the researcher and as well as how this is to knowledge social and critical theory argue that knowledge is and through the relationships between researchers and and that these relationships are through these PAR the between the researcher and the through a of the and also brings into question how knowledge is all social and critical theory with them specific of assumptions and values that research and action (e.g., for critical theory, the importance of social papers in this special issue the importance of to power relationships and how they affect knowledge construction in PAR with children. For example, and colleagues that when with children who have been with mental health adult roles need to be with respect to power and Additionally, adult roles need to change to be more with social justice children as active responsible agents and of and they view PAR as a tool for changing the way children with mental health issues are viewed and and knowledge construction are also the for Kellett In the research of an for childhood using PAR, us imagine a where children's perspectives are and children have the power to to social change. the et al. and Kellett papers, in the special us to how empowerment and social change are to the research process, from the this special all the papers are to empowerment and social change, but how they are to these issues on theories of change, which are in their guiding Another important related to guiding paradigm is how these special issue papers are positioned with respect to practices and of interventions from a post-positivist paradigm include for practices that can to of and number of papers in this issue take up these For example, upon a study designed to determine what PAR in middle et al. components and key conditions for effective and of school-based PAR, as well as challenges to implementing et al. offer a set of for engaging youth in data method of data a of activities in which youth important and those into and colleagues a for thinking about youth development and participation that is in practices from the youth development Using an empowerment they five of participation that along the of control and in their to child and health with practices are related from social and critical theory especially when the is that a focus on practices may separate knowledge from specific In other words, practices that work in one be into another and be to the same of because of different demands and this social and critical theory focus on through of In these some practices are as and are as the focus is on that all practices are and culturally the within these paradigms is that all contexts are rich and and and these in the focus is on or what should be to a and culturally intervention. The Maglajlic takes this perspective by a way to PAR across several research settings in Bosnia and a critique of of community development as children in three different one another what they from their communities and what they learn about participation in community with In a scale study with children, a suggesting that adult researchers should make and multiple methods and roles for children. As child researchers methods and adult may further and build upon the of these child researchers. In approach (2010), children create a or of their lives from a number of different including and Although assumptions about and across perspectives, both and process are designed to to the for stakeholders who are, in this children. also the need for and for child and adult research collaborators. Additionally, learned from of our us that PAR is situated in and with different guiding this set of papers also from different theoretical to PAR with children. In these papers are in one or more of the youth sociocultural perspectives, critical and community youth development is an approach that out of with research and intervention on (e.g., for abuse, or youth that the most effective programs were not directed one but more health and skills this approach challenged those in the field to about youth as resources to be rather than problems to be and Research in has on and contexts that educational outcomes, and Yet outcomes, and have been by adult including developmental psychologists and youth Also, a approach tends to be in a practices for and across contexts and diverse children. PAR programs this tradition focus on the for individual youth and competencies, and so forth. and colleagues draw from and to this tradition by a tool for those interested in settings for child and health sociocultural perspective on children that how they from being to experts is by their area or Children's expertise is through the (e.g., a and/or (e.g., an adult a child that a on a PAR from a sociocultural approach tends to engage adults in teaching children of skills so that the children can become experts in the skills and then out research that is important to them. method is in this how children become knowledge through collecting data (i.e., creating Children skills that them to their expertise with others, which them from being labeled as to socially as from a critical education framework argue that when people together and about their and their in the world, they a critical that them into action. Using a critical education perspective to PAR often take a or a approach in dialogue with that can the and focus on the of the data with an on how the data to structural Sluys this adult practices with a set of middle school to facilitate them themselves as within the structural of The children take the they have learned in their research to change their in and their to other settings. Finally, a community psychology approach empowerment through participation in problem definition and the development of PAR from a community psychology perspective focus on stakeholders and these in determining problem definition and in an to ensure that these have more control over the resources that affect their lives. and Langhout take this approach by on children defining problems for their school as well as determining potential papers in this special issue draw from more than one of these theoretical also how the researchers about the and social change process. the individual of change, PAR can be viewed as youth development youth development et al. this issue and et al. 2010), and development Chen et al. and 2010), education education Sluys 2010), or creating an setting psychology et al. and and Langhout 2010). respect to social change, PAR can be viewed as a a social or relationships and roles. in this special issue include to change et al. 2010; Newman Phillips et al. this issue), (Ren and Langhout 2010), after-school programs (Chen et al. 2010), how (Maglajlic 2010), mental health (Liegghio et al. 2010), and transportation (Porter et al. 2010). the research programs that these papers is that many of these activities are change on more than one of by a different set of the data from the same the same project a different in or the data in a different changes other of could be of the papers in this issue a about the of and PAR as a may be and for adult researchers in or community-based to about a specific and for their and it may be to around a set of Yet PAR be without attention to roles and relationships that to any the and that the and the to change the are to the of children and for example, and colleagues a project in the UK designed to engage children in the of a school and in a school These researchers on the project was not as as they power relationships and that both in public and in to perspectives and a Phillips and colleagues a project designed to engage children and in PAR, but to structural issues that from the PAR process include in the of the project that not for over time and support for to in the and the of in public in the papers provide critical of that in Another challenge in engaging in PAR with children is in how to the of adult and child research Indeed, there are several ways for adults to work with children within a PAR and there is likely one The special issue a range of from children who as primary problem to children who participate as data collection experts in studies that have been by research relationships that are in between these Children often have some but within this special children are conceptualized as both and with expertise both from and from in research are conceptualized as and experts as We to the of the adult researcher who that between adults and children are not children's Indeed, these seek to build to children's in their In all cases, the roles of children and adults set of challenges deal with and These challenges are by power in roles and relationships with many of the papers in this special The papers important questions about the conditions which children's participation may increase and/or also us that to children sometimes we what they have to The perspectives of children may as they challenge adult roles and perspectives, as well as and communities. These papers the potential of PAR to problems and challenges to the rather than to This special issue is to to a that is with rich from a variety of methods, traditions, contexts, and Although the papers are they have in they make a case that participatory action research with children is not about the same set of or from PAR with adults or older youth to a group of We a different set to this these competencies include ways of thinking about children, research research projects, and research We how it is to a special issue primarily adult even as we imagine ways of children and adults together to the that children in their goals and Yet, our intention is that in so we facilitate an of the not in our readers but in the children with we to who served as our for this special and to the Community Research and who read over and offered on an earlier of this This is the terms of the which any and in any the and are