Community researchers conducting health disparities research: Ethical and other insights from fieldwork journaling

• Published in: Social science & medicine (1982) Vol. 73; no. 1; pp. 145 - 152
• Main Authors: Mosavel, Maghboeba, Ahmed, Rashid, Daniels, Doria, Simon, Christian
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Kidlington Elsevier Ltd 01.07.2011; Elsevier; Pergamon Press Inc
• Series: Social Science & Medicine
• Subjects: Adolescent; Adolescent Mothers; Adolescents; Adult; Biological and medical sciences; Cancer; Cape Town, South Africa; Cervical cancer; Challenges; Community; Community based participatory research (CBPR); Community Participation; Community researchers; Community-engaged research; Content analysis; Data Collection; Daughters; Ethics; Female; Field work; Fieldwork; Health inequality; Health Research; Health Services Research - ethics; Health Status Disparities; Humans; Intervention; Interviews as Topic; Medical ethics; Medical research; Medical sciences; Miscellaneous; Mothers; Peer researchers; Periodicals; Public health. Hygiene; Public health. Hygiene-occupational medicine; Research Ethics; Research Personnel; South Africa; South Africa Community researchers Challenges Journals Fieldwork Community-engaged research Community based participatory research (CBPR) Peer researchers Ethics; Teaching. Deontology. Ethics. Legislation; Uterine Cervical Neoplasms - prevention & control; Writing; Young Adult; South Africa; Africa; Cape Town South Africa; Fieldwork; Ethics; Community based participatory research (CBPR); Challenges; Journals; Community researchers; Community-engaged research; South Africa; Peer researchers; Human; Community participation; Knowledge; Scientific research; Community health; Social medicine; Community action for health; Community; Public health; Inequality
• ISSN: 0277-9536; 1873-5347
• DOI: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2011.04.029

Lay persons who are trained to conduct research in their own communities form an essential part of many research projects. However, the effects of conducting research in their own communities have not been adequately explored. This paper examines the experiences, perceptions, and challenges faced by a group of community researchers during their involvement in a research project that examined if, and how, the relationships between mothers and their adolescent daughters could be harnessed to develop a daughter-initiated cervical cancer intervention. Seven community researchers interviewed 157 mother-daughter pairs in Cape Town, South Africa. We examine the use of journaling as a tool to document the experiences of community researchers, and we consider how journaling may help the community-based researcher grapple with the research process, and, more broadly, what such journal content illustrates with respect to the nature and challenges of community-engaged health research. An analysis of the content of the journals provides a strong indication of how personal and intimate the research process can be for community researchers by virtue of the background that they bring into the process as well as the additional weight of the research process itself. The complexities of navigating dual and somewhat oppositional roles – the role of impartial scientist or researcher and the role of invested community person - has been both underestimated and insufficiently researched. ► We explore the effect of conducting research on community researchers within an international health research study. ► We examine the effects of research that emphasizes objectivity while exposing individuals to subjective community life. ► Community researchers encountered personal struggles coupled with stressors induced by exposure to community conditions. ► Community members enter into a complex relationship with investigators, the research, and their own research community.