How will you share your research with participants and supporters? What input will they have about how you carry out and report on your research? What rights will you and others have to share or build on your research? Consider these questions as you plan your research and talk to others about their participation, and as you plan how to share your learnings.
Research in practice projects typically involve practitioners and students who have previous and ongoing relationships. Practitioners and students usually have different authority and power in a program, and often have different social identities and locations. At the same time, students and practitioners may have friendly, trusting relationships. Both situations have implications for voluntary and informed choice to participate in research. They may affect how students share information, what information is shared, and how you are able to separate the research data from other knowledge you have about the research participants.
When researchers and participants have a relationship of trust, participants might be inclined to give blanket permission to use whatever they share. This places additional responsibility on the researcher, as Janet Bauer (2004) found in her research with a writing group:
I was continually amazed at the personal nature of some of the things we shared within the group, and at times I felt overwhelmed with the broad freedom the women gave me to share anything. I did not want to misuse or abuse that trust. At one point during the VALTA Project, we had discussed informed consent. The guiding principle I took from the discussion was to "do no harm." It is my hope that my writing reflects the respect and admiration I hold for this amazing group of women. (p. 85)
In discussing researcher-participant relations, Kirsch (1999) makes a distinction between "friendliness" and "friendship," advocating that researchers be friendly, but not establish friendships. Many of the factors that one considers in developing teacher-learner relationships are similar to those we need to consider in researcher-participant relations. This includes what information to share about ourselves and how to respond to requests for information or other assistance.
Voluntary participation and the right to withdraw at any time without penalty are fundamental in research. It is easy to turn down a request to complete a survey or questionnaire when we don't have a relationship with the researcher. It may not be so easy when there is an established relationship between the researcher and participants. Some practitioners may decide not to do research with students in their class or program for this reason.