Helle Merete Nordentoft and Birgitte Ravn Olesen
The purpose of the paper is to show power mechanisms of in- and exclusion in moments where certain participants appeared to be othered in two collaborative research and…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of the paper is to show power mechanisms of in- and exclusion in moments where certain participants appeared to be othered in two collaborative research and development projects in a healthcare setting.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper contributes to critical-reflexive analyses of reflexive processes within collaborative knowledge production. The authors use an analytical framework combining Bakhtin and Foucault to investigate processes of inclusion and exclusion in the interplay between dominant and subordinated voices in a moment-by-moment analysis of two incidents from interdisciplinary workshops.
Findings
The analysis illuminates how differences between voices challenge participants’ reflexive awareness and lead to the reproduction of contextual power and knowledge hierarchies and the concomitant silencing of particular participants. Thus, the findings draw attention to the complex and ethical nature of collaborative knowledge production.
Practical implications
To invite researchers to be reflexive about the complex, situated and emergent character of reflexive processes and consider ethics to be a critical stance that encourages continuous reflection and critique of collaborative knowledge production.
Originality/value
To show the importance of not sweeping incidents in which participants are othered “under the carpet” in collaborative research. To present an analytical framework for analysing the contextual and emergent nature of collaborative research processes and discuss the ethical conundrums, which arise in the research process.
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Birgitte Ravn Olesen and Helle Merete Nordentoft
The purpose of this paper is to discuss the ethical complexity and dilemmas, which arise in the co-production of knowledge between researchers and other participants.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to discuss the ethical complexity and dilemmas, which arise in the co-production of knowledge between researchers and other participants.
Design/methodology/approach
The starting point for the paper is a narrative from a conference the authors attended where the authors, as researchers, found themselves on slippery and emotionally charged ground. Using a critical, reflexive approach informed by post-structuralism, the ambition was to deconstruct gaps between rhetoric and practice and critique normative understandings of the nature of ethically sound co-production processes in collaborative research. More specifically, at the conference, the authors sought to expose and discuss the gap between the good intentions and the own practice as researchers in a collaborative research project at a major hospital. However, instead of reflexive discussions with the research community, the authors experienced that the conduct was criticized and categorized as unethical practice.
Findings
Instead of omitting sensitive phenomena from the research process, the authors argue that it is an ethical imperative to investigate these phenomena in order to gain insight into what is at stake in dialogical, reflexive processes not only between researchers and research participants—but also between researchers in the research community. An awareness of the emergent nature of power relations in all processes of knowledge production may strengthen the practical validity of “co-produced” knowledge in action research.
Originality/value
A poststructuralist perspective on collaborative research processes reveals normative expectations regarding ethical research practice and provides insight into the tensions in collaborative research that arise irrespective of the individual competence (or not) of the researcher.
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Helle Merete Nordentoft and Karen Wistoft
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the process and learning outcomes of peer collaboration in a Danish health developmental project in school health nursing. The paper…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the process and learning outcomes of peer collaboration in a Danish health developmental project in school health nursing. The paper explores how peer collaboration influences the school nurses' collaborative learning and competence development.
Design/methodology/approach
The article is based on data from a three‐year health educational development project at primary schools in Denmark. These data are observations from 12 reflective workshops with school nurses, two questionnaire surveys, and five focus group interviews with five of the six sub‐projects after the project was over. In the workshops, the questionnaire surveys and the focus group interviews the school nurses were asked to reflect on the developmental process, their collaboration, own and mutual pedagogical competence development.
Findings
Systematic peer collaboration between school nurses qualifies their learning and ability to reflect on practice, their communication with colleagues and children, and the development of new and innovative approaches to school health nursing. The introduction of peer collaboration, however, takes time and energy and it can be a challenge to introduce peer collaboration into a working culture in which school nurses traditionally work alone under prominent work and time pressures.
Research limitations/implications
The study is explorative. Further research could explore the connection between collaborative learning among school nurses and the development of their competences in school health nursing.
Practical implications
The paper outlines how and why collaboration among school nurses should be introduced in a more systematic way into school health nursing.
Originality/value
The paper investigates the connection between informal educational activities for SNs and possible learning outcomes for practice. Specifically, the paper looks into different ways in which SNs collaborate and the findings contribute to new understandings of how SNs' practice can be organised in order to stimulate school nurses' participation and collaborative learning and increase the quality of school health nursing.