Swearer Center for Public Service

Engaged Research

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Engaged Research

Effective engaged scholars ground rigorous research in intentional, equitable collaborations with community-based partners. Research collaborators draw on multiple forms and sources of knowledge when defining research questions, developing research designs, gathering and analyzing data and applying findings.

We have a tremendous opportunity to make a transformative impact in the lives of individuals, families and communities locally, nationally and globally.

Brown’s Operational Plan for Investing in Research

Well-executed engagement can improve research quality, heighten impact, enhance the public’s esteem of science, and improve the applicability of research for addressing real-world problems.

Academy Health Engagement Science: An Overview of the Landscape of Engaged Research

Like others striving for public impact, they emphasize public relevance and seek to address systemic inequities and complex (often interdisciplinary) issues. Many research projects include stakeholder input, whether collecting data through surveys, interviews or focus groups and/or asking for stakeholder perspectives to inform project development.

Engaged research is distinct in its commitment to co-creation, not simply consent and input. It includes community members as full participants and collaborators, which helps avoid what communities too often experience as extractive research. Engagement may lead to a wide variety of scholarly products – not only traditional peer-reviewed publications, but also toolkits, videos, white papers, evaluation or technical reports, exhibits and more. 

Other terms for engaged research include:

  • community-based participatory research (CBPR)
  • participatory action research (PAR)
  • patient-centered outcome research
  • citizen or community science

The Swearer Center staff is available to consult on any aspect of engaged research; contact Julie Plaut, Director of Engaged Scholarship.

Additional resources include:

Know of a community priority or project? Share the opportunity through the Community Partnership Interest form.

For grounding yourself in basic definitions, principles and approaches, we recommend the following resources:

Many resources on research partnerships in education and health can also be useful to researchers in other fields; examples include:

If you understand the basics of engaged research and want to start developing research partnerships, recommended resources include:

Whether you use quantitative, qualitative or mixed methods in your research, you can adopt a participatory approach. In addition to drawing on the resources above, you might start by: 

Additional Resources:

“Even the act of evaluating the quantity and quality of community engagement can contribute to strengthening relationships and improving communication. Such evaluations can help provide benchmarks for the state of the partnership, as well as provide indicators of which factors/principles need more attention.”. 

“What We’ve Learned About Approaches to Community Engaged Research”, (Evidence in Action, based on interview with Dr. Melody Goodman) 

Engaged research project assessment can not only document results but also foster learning, authenticity, equity and co-creation of knowledge:

Making intentional change can feel messy and uncomfortable. It requires openness to new perspectives and unlearning old ones. It requires shifting power dynamics, departing from how ‘it has always been done.’ Starting from relationship and accountability, researchers can unlock immense creativity to achieve the promise of what knowledge can yield for communities.

Chicago Beyond “Why Am I Always Being Researched?” A Guidebook (2018)

Examples of Engaged Research

For examples of engaged research at Brown, see our stories of impact.

Stories of Impact