Professor Huw Davies - Heriot-Watt University St A KT conf Apr 08...Professor Huw Davies Yes, it’s quite a noise – but are we having any impact? The challenge for all of us in

DirectorSocial Dimensions of Health Institute (SDHI)

Universities of St Andrews & DundeeCo-founder

Research Unit for Research Utilisation (RURU)Universities of Edinburgh & St Andrews

What do we know about research use?

Professor Huw Davies

Yes, it’s quite a noise – but are we having any impact?

The challenge for all of us in the knowledge business…

“Social science should be at the heart of policy making… we need social scientists to help determine what works and why, and what types of policy initiatives are likely to be most effective.”

David Blunkett, Secretary of State for Education

“What matters is What Works”

AND: “No one with the slightest common-sense could take seriously suggestions by University researchers that homework is bad for you.”

the very same, David Blunkett, Secretary of State for Education

But policy & evidence sometimes collide…

“There is nothing a politician likes so little as to be well-informed.

It makes decision making so complex and so difficult…”

John Maynard Keynes

(and maybe “using evidence” isn’t so straightforward after all…)

Health care, social care, education and criminal justice

Research Unit for Research Utilisation

- RURU –Sandra Nutley, Isabel Walter, Huw DaviesUniversities of Edinburgh & St Andrews

Peter Smith, University of York

www.ruru.ac.uk

A resource on literatures related to research use

What do we mean by research and

evidence?

Understanding the complexitiesof using research for knowledge.

Implications for facilitating more

research use?

CEO

Modelling knowledge production and useTraditional linear model – assumes rather

uncomplicated relationships between research/knowledge and knowledge/action

Knowledge Creation

Knowledge validation

Knowledge Dissemination

Knowledge adoption

Researchers Users

KT

Too - simple, rational, linear, uni-directional, individualised, unproblematised, asocial, and acontextual (otherwise, OK…)

Research - Evidence - Knowledge

* very uncertain process, combining –- other systematic sources of knowledge, - experience and/or expert advice,- existing (tacit) knowledge, and - values…

* knowledge is socially and contextually situated…

* often end up with contested or even conflictingknowledge, with power entering the mix…

Gaining knowledge from social research

The complexities of policy actionSOMETIMES:• clearly defined event• explicit decisions • conscious deliberation • defined policies • policy fixed at

implementation

OFTENTIMES:• ongoing process• piecemeal: no single decision• muddling through• policies emerge and accrete• shaped through

implementation

Role of research evidence contingent:Engineered vs Shapingsolutions debates

Key message for Social Research:

Recognising instead:• The importance of context;• Interaction with other types of

knowledge (tacit; experiential);• Multi-voiced iterative dialogue;• ‘Use’ as a process not an event.

…moving us away from ideas of “packaging” knowledge and doing “knowledge transfer”.

Interactive, social and interpretive models of “research use” better reflect what actually happens…

Improving research use: addressing supply, demand, and that in between

Improving stocks or reservoirs of research-informed knowledge

- academic and other -

Increasing demand in policy, service and professional worlds, and wider society

intermediationIncreasingResearch translation, knowledge management and knowledge pools, research brokering and boundary spanning, co-location, secondments and role cycling, partnerships of all kinds,

sustained interactivity…

Challenges of sustained interactivity:• Maintaining dialogue across divergent cultures…

…lack of incentives,uncertain rewards