Creating online participatory research spaces

Lomax, Helen; Smith, Kate; McEvoy, Jo; Brickwood, Eleanor; S.H. Jensen, Kathrine; Walsh, Belinda

Abstract

Our article draws on research undertaken with children during the 2020–21 COVID-19 pandemic in order to consider the potential of digitally mediated participatory research for child-centred research practice. Our specific focus is on how children’s inclusion can be centred in the absence of opportunities to meet in person. We reflect on how we sought to support children’s engagement through offline and online creative activities and explore how these digitally mediated spaces can facilitate children’s inclusion, creative engagement and dialogue. We offer examples from our arts-based, digitally mediated research to consider how researchers might work remotely, yet inclusively, in contexts where children have been marginalised and their voices silenced. Our research suggests that scaffolding creative activities through bespoke digital animation and asynchronous chat can facilitate children to participate in ways of their choosing. However, to address equity of inclusion researchers must attend to the contingencies of children’s digital, material and social exclusion.

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: May 31, 2021
• Publication Date: Feb 1, 2022
• Deposit Date: May 19, 2025
• Publicly Available Date: May 21, 2025
• Journal: Families, Relationships and Societies
• Print ISSN: 2046-7435
• Electronic ISSN: 2046-7443
• Publisher: Policy Press
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1332/204674321X16274828934070