Sharing research findings with participants

Sharing research findings can help people feel part of the research process rather than just research subjects
Sharpham Trust forest

It can be a valuable part of your research to check the themes and ideas directly with participants after you have analysed your main data. You may also find extra information about who, what or where people have experienced wellbeing if this was missing from your original evidence.

Research method Preparation time Time to gather data Time to analyse data Not suitable for ... Does data indicate wellbeing? Who, what, where people experience wellbeing? Is it an activity in itself?
Sharing research findings with participants See individual methods for times 30 mins – 1 hour Quick unless new things come to light People who haven’t engaged with the research process Used to validate (or not) previous findings Yes – can be used to find this if missing from original data gathering No
 Suitable for:

  • all participants who have engaged in the research process.

What information is collected?

  • if your group has disbanded you could use a follow-up survey to do research from a distance
  • interviews and group discussions may be the most straightforward way of collecting information.

Watch out for:

  • asking leading questions – it may be particularly easy to do at this stage as it’s tempting to encourage people to agree with what you think the research has found
  • if participants have not engaged in the research process you may find it hard to ask them about your findings.

Methods

A number of different methods can be used to validate your findings.

Presenting participants with raw data

You might want to present some raw data to participants so that they can comment or respond to it e.g. photos and videos that you have taken as part of the research. This might be particularly useful if you want to find out or corroborate who, what or where wellbeing comes from.

Presenting participants with findings

You could present participants with your findings (after you have analysed your data and pulled out themes). You could present examples of things that participants have said or done which you feel back up your findings and see whether they agree or disagree.

Adaptations: if you have limited time you could choose to focus on particular participants e.g. one teacher rather than all the children in a class. You could also share your findings with a group leader/practitioner who was not involved with the research but knows the group well if you no longer have access to the group.

Follow-up activities to corroborate findings

You could use questions in interviews and surveys to ask about specific points in your findings that you’d like to check or corroborate.