“The more I worked with the people on this project, the more I realised how little I knew. I would have got it wrong otherwise, and might have had the door slammed in my face for asking the wrong questions!” [Reference 14, page 11] Both concluded that the study had been very successful, because it had managed to gather the views of large numbers of local Gypsies and Travellers about their health and accommodation needs. Similar projects in other parts of the country did not succeed in capturing this information. Again using this example to develop a logic model (see Fig. 2), while collaborating with community members on research design (activity), the researcher heard about the interests and concerns of Travellers (learning) that led her to rephrase her interview questions and include female interviewers i.e. to change her research design (changed behaviour) which appears to have contributed to obtaining high quality data and therefore an improved understanding of accommodation needs by the local council (impact). Input Activity Short-term Medium-term Long-term outcome outcome impact Learning Behaviour Culture & conditions Gypsies and Discussing the Researcher learns Change to research High quality data - Travellers project design about the design to a better invited and community’s needs understanding of supported to and concerns in the community’s join a project relation to accommodation Steering Group interviews on this needs topic Fig. 2. A logic model developed using Example 2. An important lesson here is that the researcher had no idea beforehand that this is what she would learn from working with Travellers. This was an ‘unknown unknown’ before she started. So while a researcher might expect involvement to address their ‘known unknowns’, for example they might start with questions such as ‘Is it reasonable to ask people to answer all these questions? What’s an acceptable length of time for an interview?’, on occasion what they learn is unexpected [17]. Researchers sometimes don’t know, what they don’t know. The assumptions they make in the absence of knowledge about patients’/ the public’s experiences, are only revealed and then
“The more I worked with the people on this project, the more I realised how little I knew. I would have got it wrong otherwise, and might have had the door slammed in my face for asking the wrong questions!” [Reference 14, page 11] Both concluded that the study had been very successful, because it had managed to gather the views of large numbers of local Gypsies and Travellers about their health and accommodation needs. Similar projects in other parts of the country did not succeed in capturing this information. Again using this example to develop a logic model (see Fig. 2), while collaborating with community members on research design (activity), the researcher heard about the interests and concerns of Travellers (learning) that led her to rephrase her interview questions and include female interviewers i.e. to change her research design (changed behaviour) which appears to have contributed to obtaining high quality data and therefore an improved understanding of accommodation needs by the local council (impact). Input Activity Short-term outcome Learning Medium-term outcome Behaviour Long-term impact Culture & conditions Gypsies and Travellers invited and supported to join a project Steering Group Discussing the project design Researcher learns about the community’s needs and concerns in relation to interviews on this topic Change to research design High quality data to a better understanding of the community’s accommodation needs Fig. 2. A logic model developed using Example 2. An important lesson here is that the researcher had no idea beforehand that this is what she would learn from working with Travellers. This was an ‘unknown unknown’ before she started. So while a researcher might expect involvement to address their ‘known unknowns’, for example they might start with questions such as ‘Is it reasonable to ask people to answer all these questions? What’s an acceptable length of time for an interview?’, on occasion what they learn is unexpected [17]. Researchers sometimes don’t know, what they don’t know. The assumptions they make in the absence of knowledge about patients’/ the public’s experiences, are only revealed and then -
A-link-between-learning-and-impact-22-June-17.docx