Chris Ackerley and Ellen Balka
This blog post is based on the Evidence & Policy article, ‘Navigating boundaries in coproduced research: a situational analysis of researchers’ experiences within integrated knowledge translation projects.’
Increasingly, researchers are collaborating with partners outside of academia – including patients, practitioners and policymakers – to create evidence that aims to be more useful and usable in practice. In the Canadian health sector, this kind of research coproduction is often called integrated knowledge translation (IKT).
A central idea in research coproduction is that bringing together people with different expertise is more likely create impactful evidence. Yet, collaborators’ differences can also present practical challenges for research projects.
To explore this tension, our study asked: How do researchers understand, experience, and manage boundaries in Canadian IKT health research projects?
We did 20 interviews with researchers leading IKT projects and one in-depth case study observing an IKT project in action. We focused on analyzing the researchers’ discourse – defined here as sets of statements about reality that organize and structure the way in which a particular topic, object, or process is talked about or represented.
Our study identified four key discursive positions that IKT researchers took regarding boundaries. The positions can be mapped along two spectrums: the degree to which boundaries are viewed as a problem, and the degree to which researchers believe boundaries should (or could) be challenged.
Researchers take varied approaches to boundaries
No single approach is right or wrong. Instead, the positions are like a ‘menu,’ from which researchers select strategically – and often unconsciously – to satisfy their needs.
Recognize & handle
Discourse from this position sees boundaries as practical problems that trap knowledge. It appreciates that boundaries are inevitable – if inconvenient – results of expert specialization. Boundaries are seen as unfortunate but inevitable features of IKT that must be handled, or else they will hinder success.
Metaphorically, this position approaches boundaries like obstacles in an obstacle course. With the right training and approach, they can be overcome, but they inevitably slow progress towards the end goal.
Respect & clarify
Discourse from this position views respecting clear boundaries as essential to success in IKT. Boundaries themselves are not seen as a problem – problems only arise from a lack of clear boundaries or respect for them. Setting boundaries around people’s expertise is understood as a prerequisite for successful collaboration.
In this position, expertise and team members can be understood metaphorically as puzzle pieces, whose boundaries must be clear to fit cohesively.
Blur & integrate
Discourse reflecting this position sees boundaries as problematic obstacles to IKT, which should be de-emphasized and erased. This position holds that removing boundaries to knowledge sharing facilitates true innovation.
This position can be conveyed through the metaphor of baking, where different ingredients are combined and integrated, prompting chemical reactions that create something new.
Challenge & embrace
Discourses reflecting this position see boundaries not as problems, but as vital to producing transformative IKT research. Yet, rather than accepting and respecting boundaries, this discursive position sees the benefit of boundaries emerging exactly when they are challenged, pushed, and redrawn, and the resulting conflicts are embraced and encouraged.
A possible metaphor for this position that of opposable fingers and thumbs, where teams use their differences to hold and transform their ideas through productive tensions.
A reflection tool
For those considering or doing research coproduction, using this 2×2 map and easily understandable metaphors can help collaborators reflect on their underlying assumptions about boundaries (e.g., as obstacles, puzzle pieces that fit together, ingredients to combine for baking, or opposing fingers and thumbs).
Ultimately, recognizing the diversity of possible discursive positions on boundaries in IKT projects can help those practising and studying IKT identify their own discursive positions in different situations, recognize others’ stances, and strategically adapt as needed.
* Figure 1 is not covered by a Creative Commons licence and is not to be reproduced without prior permission from the publisher, Bristol University Press.
Image credits: “Climbing the wall” Courtesy of the U.S. Airforce by Joseph Thompson; “Puzzle” Courtesy of Pexels; “Dough” Courtesy of Pixabay; “Colour Pen” Courtesy of Pexels
Chris Ackerley, MA, is a Fulbright doctoral candidate in the University of Washington’s Interdisciplinary PhD program. Chris’ research focuses on evidence-to-policy communication processes and their intersections with rhetoric of science and expertise. Contact at chris001@uw.edu.
Ellen Balka, PhD, is a professor in Simon Fraser University’s School of Communication. Her interdisciplinary research focuses design, implementation and use of information technology in all aspects of health care. Contact at ellenb@sfu.ca.
Read the original research in Evidence & Policy:
Ackerley, C. and Balka, E. (2023). Navigating boundaries in coproduced research: a situational analysis of researchers’ experiences within integrated knowledge translation projects. Evidence & Policy, DOI: 10.1332/174426421X16880459012690.
If you enjoyed this blog post, you may also be interested in reading:
Improving evidence use: a systematic scoping review of local models of knowledge mobilisation OPEN ACCESS
Knowledge Utilisation Analysis: measuring the utilisation of knowledge sources in policy decisions
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