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Research end-user perspectives about using social work research in policy and practice

  • Clare Tilbury
    ,
  • Mark Hughes
    ,
  • Christine Bigby
    ,
  • Mike Fisher
Research Output: Contribution to journal Article Peer-review

Open access

Abstract

Research funding and assessment initiatives that foster engagement between researchers and research end-users have been adopted by governments in many countries. They aim to orient research towards achieving measurable impacts that improve economic and social well-being beyond academia. This has long been regarded as important in social work research, as it has in many fields of applied research. This study examined research engagement and impact from the perspective of research end-users working in human services. In-person or telephone interviews were conducted with 43 research end-users about how they used research and interacted with researchers. Content analysis was undertaken to identify engagement strategies and thematic coding was employed to examine underpinning ideas about research translation into practice. Participants were involved in many types of formal and informal research engagements. They viewed research translation as a mutual responsibility but indicated that researchers should do more to improve the utility of their research for industry. The findings highlight the iterative nature of engagement and impact and raise questions about the infrastructure for scaling up impact beyond relationships between individual researchers and their industry partners.

Publication Information

Output type

Research Output: Contribution to journal Article Peer-review

Original language

English

Pages from-to (Number of pages)

Pages 1186-1202 (17 pages)

Journal (Volume, Issue Number)

British Journal of Social Work (Volume 51, Issue 4)

Publication milestones

  • Accepted/In press - 24/01/2021
  • Published - 14/02/2021

Publication status

Published - 14/02/2021

ISSN

0045-3102

External Publication IDs

  • handle.net: 10547/624810
  • Scopus: 85126788083

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