UC Davis Department of Human Ecology, University of California, Davis, CA 95616, USA.
Department of Human and Organizational Development, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN 37235, USA.
Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2020 Feb 13;17(4):1187. doi: 10.3390/ijerph17041187.
Community-engaged research is understood as existing on a continuum from less to more community engagement, defined by participation and decision-making authority. It has been widely assumed that more is better than less engagement. However, we argue that what makes for good community engagement is not simply the extent but the fit or alignment between the intended approach and the various contexts shaping the research projects. This article draws on case studies from three Community Engagement Cores (CECs) of NIEHS-funded Environmental Health Science Core Centers (Harvard University, UC Davis and University of Arizona,) to illustrate the ways in which community engagement approaches have been fit to different contexts and the successes and challenges experienced in each case. We analyze the processes through which the CECs work with researchers and community leaders to develop place-based community engagement approaches and find that different strategies are called for to fit distinct contexts. We find that alignment of the scale and scope of the environmental health issue and related research project, the capacities and resources of the researchers and community leaders, and the influences of the sociopolitical environment are critical for understanding and designing effective and equitable engagement approaches. These cases demonstrate that the types and degrees of alignment in community-engaged research projects are dynamic and evolve over time. Based on this analysis, we recommend that CBPR scholars and practitioners select a range of project planning and management techniques for designing and implementing their collaborative research approaches and both expect and allow for the dynamic and changing nature of alignment.
社区参与式研究被理解为存在一个连续体，从较少到更多的社区参与，由参与和决策权来定义。人们普遍认为，更多的参与比更少的参与更好。然而，我们认为，良好的社区参与不仅仅取决于参与的程度，还取决于预期方法与塑造研究项目的各种背景之间的契合度或一致性。本文借鉴了 NIEHS 资助的环境健康科学核心中心的三个社区参与核心（CEC）（哈佛大学、加州大学戴维斯分校和亚利桑那大学）的案例研究，来说明社区参与方法如何适应不同的背景，以及每种情况下的成功和挑战。我们分析了 CEC 与研究人员和社区领袖合作制定基于地点的社区参与方法的过程，并发现需要不同的策略来适应不同的背景。我们发现，环境健康问题及其相关研究项目的规模和范围、研究人员和社区领袖的能力和资源以及社会政治环境的影响对于理解和设计有效的、公平的参与方法至关重要。这些案例表明，社区参与式研究项目中的一致性类型和程度是动态的，并随着时间的推移而演变。基于此分析，我们建议 CBPR 学者和实践者为设计和实施他们的合作研究方法选择一系列项目规划和管理技术，并期望和允许一致性的动态和变化性质。
