Participatory Action Research (PAR) with Children and Youth: An Integrative Review of Methodology and PAR Outcomes for Participants, Organizations, and Communities

Background and purpose:

Research shows that only about 15% of community-based participatory action research (PAR) studies about children and youth issues include individuals in these groups as participants.  PAR is based on the principle of shared power between a researcher and a participant when it comes to knowledge generation. However, the biggest ethical struggle of PAR approach is “genuine participation” which can be operationalized as involvement beyond being just a data source (ex. children’s participation in recommendation development).  Despite the rapid development of discourse around children’s participation in research, there is no integrative review of evidence that would empirically support this claim. Additionally,  little is known about methodological features of PAR studies with children and youth.  The research questions that this review aims to answer are (1) what are the methodological characteristics of PAR studies involving children and youth at the level of “genuine participation” and (2) what are the outcomes of PAR for children and youth, organizations, and communities?

 Method

Using Whittemore & Knalf’s approach for conducting an integrative review of the evidence, seven search engines were used to identify the PAR studies. Keywords for search included “participatory action research”, “participatory research”, “community-based participatory research”, “children”, “youth”, “teenagers”, “adolescents”. In the first selection round, only empirical PAR studies focused on social issues, published between 2000-2016 and with the presence of children and youth younger than 18 in the sample were selected. As a result, 242 studies were identified. At the second round, only studies that reported PAR outcomes for children, organizations and communities and claimed children’s participation beyond just a data source were included.  Forty-seven studies were selected for the review.  

Results

Participation of young children in research is a big challenge. Children participated in 11 different stages of the research process, most often being involved in the latest stage of PAR, especially for the dissemination of findings and development of recommendations. Fourteen research methodologies were used with qualitative methods more frequently utilized.  Integration of evidence suggests that as a result of participation in PAR, children were able to achieve positive developmental outcomes. Organizations where PAR was implemented exhibit a shift towards child-inclusive cultures, an increased sensitization of their programs to the needs of children and youth, and an expansion oftheir advocacy and fundraising campaigns. Communities gained established platforms for intergenerational dialogues and policy changes, as well as child-friendly infrastructure.

Conclusion and Implication

Despite the fact that PAR with children and youth has a goal of addressing power differences at its core, it is still being overlooked by social work research. Among the studies reviewed, only one was published by a social work researcher and only four studies were published in social work journals. Recognizing the voicelessness of children and youth in social work research should be a major step for the inclusion of young vulnerable clients into the process of social change.  This may be accomplished through PAR which, as this review shows, has a multitude of potential for positive impact on their lives.