Co-creation in citizen social science: the research forum as a methodological foundation for communication and participation

Abstract

This paper addresses the emerging methodological debate about citizen social science from the perspective of participatory research methods. The paper introduces the research forum as a horizontal and safe communicative space moderated by academic researchers that enables co-researcher participation across all phases of co-creational research projects. It is argued that in co-creational citizen social science, such a communicative space requires conceptualisation in order for it to foster citizens’ engagement in the knowledge production that deals with their specific social lifeworlds. In the research forum, the potential that the social sciences bring to citizen science—methodological reflection and the theoretical interpretation and contextualisation of data—can flourish in a collaborative process. Based on the expertise in co-created research in multigenerational co-housing projects, the paper reflects on practical experiences with the research forum in terms of four central dimensions: (1) opening up spaces for social encounters; (2) establishing communicative practice; (3) initiating a process of social self-understanding; (4) engaging in (counter-)public discourses. Finally, the paper closes with a summary of potential and challenges that the research forum provides as a methodological foundation for co-creation in citizen social science projects.

Play the Pain: A Digital Strategy for Play-Oriented Research and Action

“…However, as Bergold and Thomas have argued, creating a situation that tolerates conflictual views also creates conditions for valuable self-reflexivity and negotiation to advance research (248). Similarly to our proposal, Thomas et al have argued that meta-communication provides a path forward in resolving conflicts in participatory citizen research projects (71). This requires that the users of DiSPORA are made aware of the risks of such conflicts, and consent to play to communicate (rather than to receive pain "therapy" or "find a winning solution").…”

“…Similarly to our proposal, Thomas et al have argued that meta-communication provides a path forward in resolving conflicts in participatory citizen research projects ( 71 ). This requires that the users of DiSPORA are made aware of the risks of such conflicts, and consent to play to communicate (rather than to receive pain “therapy” or “find a winning solution”).…”

“…According to Thomas, Scheller and Schroder, a citizen laboratory for social research must offer: (1) a space for social encounters; (2) a frame for communicative practice; (3) a process to initiate social self-understanding; (4) and dynamics that allow participants to engage in and counter public discourse ( 71 ). However, pain is also a biomedical condition and, as such, collecting quantitative data is important to conduct analyses that establish the correlations between psychosocial determinants of pain experience and the outcome of interventions.…”

“…In the section above on Integrating Context and Experience in Pain Research we suggested some ways in which ICTs can benefit such research, and in section The Promise of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) for Integrative Pain Research , we listed the shortcomings of existing implementations of ICT in health research. DiSPORA proposes to overcome some of these limitations by creating a framework for capturing participants' perspectives through a scalable framework that takes advantage of the affordances of play as a meta-communication strategy ( 32 , 205 , 225 , 243 , 247 ) in a citizen science participatory research laboratory ( 47 , 48 , 53 , 71 , 169 ). Of course, in itself, the use of DiSPORA does not establish the conditions necessary for participatory research.…”

“…Vast resources have been dedicated to data mining from biological specimens, extensive arrays of psychometric and physiological measures, and various types of radiological data (67,68). However, active engagement of stakeholders and research participants at every stage of project development from its earliest conception, through design, data collection and interpretation, to translation into policy and practice can improve the relevance, quality and impact of health research (40,(69)(70)(71)(72)(73)(74)(75)(76)(77)(78)(79)(80).…”