The NCRM are pleased to announce the results of our first International Visitor Exchange Scheme (IVES) competition. Applications for visits to the UK by leading researchers in social science methodology were invited, along with early and mid-career researchers to visit centres of methodological expertise in the social sciences abroad. A summary of the successful applications are below and events related to the visits will be held throughout 2016. So please keep an eye out for some of the innovative methodological events that will be developed through the NCRM IVES fellowships.
Dr Mick Couper, an expert in survey research methodology from the Institute for Social Research (ISR) at the University of Michigan will be visiting the Institute for Socio-Economic Research (ISER) at the University of Essex. He will work with Dr Annette Jäckle on the use of new technologies for data collection, such as new mobile and digital technologies, in longitudinal surveys such as Understanding Society. Large scale social surveys are increasingly interested in using new technologies to complement their existing questionnaires. Using new technologies could provide data on new topics, at a cheaper cost, and potentially with fewer errors. However, only a few surveys have trialled data collection using new technologies. They will work on research addressing some of the barriers to the incorporation of new technologies in data collection around:
• concerns about how respondents react to requests for data collection using new technologies and whether this will affect response rates to the main questionnaire,
• limited survey budgets that do not allow for development and testing,
• a lack of a theoretical framework to guide the understanding of potential error sources in data collected using new technologies, and
• a lack of guidance on best practices for data collection using new technologies.
Dr Couper will also deliver an NCRM short course on some of these topics during his visit.
Dr Michelle Fine and Jill Bradbury will be visiting the Centre for Narrative Research, at the University of East London, hosted by Dr Corinne Squire. Dr Fine is from the Department of Social and Personality Psychology, The City University of New York, and is a leading force in participatory action research and social science advocacy. Dr Jill Bradbury, from the Psychology Department at Witwatersrand University, is the founder of Narrative Enquiry for Social Transformation, a South Africa-wide network, with methodological expertise in the context of social justice. Some of the key debates in narrative research are around how ‘participation’ relates to varied narrative research approaches, such as visual, ethnographic, longitudinal, digital, and multi-modal methods. In addition, the links between narratives and social transformation are increasingly salient for social researchers focused on inequality, precarity, climate change, post-conflict, migration, transnationalism, and decoloniality. They will develop and facilitate:
• a two-day methodology colloquium at UEL with presentations on multidisciplinary perspectives on narrative methodologies, participation, and social transformation,
• a proposal for an edited book on narrative, participation and social transformation,
• an NCRM short course and two methods workshops addressing participation issues in narrative research, and in working in contexts of social transformation,
• the development of a new international network on innovative methods for participatory and socially transformative research.
Dr Helen Johnson, from the School of Applied Social Science, University of Brighton, will collaborate with poets (young slam/spoken word artists) to co-produce autobiographical poems of their experiences. Youth slam and spoken word (YSSW) is a form of poetry, which is delivered primarily in oral performance and helps young people explore and express their experiences. It is particularly popular in the US, where thousands of young people participate in YSSW groups and events and it is especially prominent amongst marginalised, inner city youth and is often used to explore difficult issues, such as sexist, racist and heterosexist prejudice. Dr Johnson will visit Prof. Claudia Mitchell at the Department for Integrated Studies in Education at McGill University, Montreal to develop:
• the ‘poetic autoethnography’ method for wider use, particularly amongst social scientists in the UK,
• a journal article, detailing the pilot project’s methods and creative/academic outputs,
• a half-day workshop at the University of Brighton, aimed at social scientists; artist-practitioners and local organisations
• a short film, depicting workshop activities and sections of the final poetry performance.
There will be another round of IVES funding announced in early 2016 for visiting fellowships to start later in the year. Please look out for the announcement on the NCRM webpages www.ncrm.ac.uk.