2023/24
5 Projects were funded as part of the 2023/24 Participatory Research Fund. You can read more about the projects below.
AMPLIFY (A Meaningful Peer-Led Involvement network For Young people)
Abigail Thomson, Dr Georgina Hosang, Dr Sania Shakoor, Dr Laura Havers, Irene Gonzalez Calvo (Wolfson Institute of Population Health)
Youth mental health research is most effective when a diverse group of young people are actively included at every stage of the research process – from design through to dissemination. However, there is a recognised need to improve engagement with underrepresented youth, particularly those from communities with higher ethnic density or economic and social disadvantages, such as East London.
One strategy to address this is community-based participatory research, a collaborative approach that involves researchers and community members as equal partners in the research process. The AMPLIFY network, co-created in a recent pilot with 16-18-year-olds in East London, seeks to facilitate the meaningful application of community-based participatory methods in current research for young people within the Centre for Psychiatry and Mental Health.
Thus far, AMPLIFY has been successful in engaging underrepresented youth and exploring the challenges young people from East London face in engaging in research. Building on this work, we will take forward learning to develop participatory research that addresses the issues and experiences of young people. In this next phase of AMPLIFY, the emphasis is on increasing the delivery of participatory research across several stages, developing opportunities for our young participants, and creating a legacy for sustained implementation of AMPLIFY.
Best practice in arts-based social prescribing: A framework identifying ‘key elements’ in the delivery of arts in health activities, co-produced with artists from our East London network
Dr Francesca Cornaglia (School of Economics and Finance), Dr Maria Grazia Turri (Wolfson Institute of Population Health), Dr Vivian S. Vigliotti (Yale New Haven Health)
Recognition and established research evidence indicate that engagement with the arts is associated with lower levels of mental distress and increased wellbeing. In the UK, social prescribing has been implemented, integrating social, cultural, and community activities as recognised treatment options.
Over the past year, an ongoing network of stakeholders involved in arts-based social prescribing in East London has been curated. This network includes artists, health professionals, policymakers, and funders.
Artists within this network have highlighted the challenges faced in delivering social prescribing due to the absence of a coherent framework for training and practices suited to arts in health activities.
Artists delivering arts activities for social prescribing are experts in the field. This study will collaborate with them to explore a research question they have identified, focusing on:
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Identifying ‘key elements’ in their practice that contribute to the creation of therapeutic spaces for participants, including individuals with mental health difficulties, other health concerns, and wellbeing needs.
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Designing a framework based on these ‘key elements’ to inform best practice guidelines, supporting the training of artists who are relatively new to arts in health practice.
What are the barriers for young black men (YBM) who are seeking healthcare? A photovoice service evaluation
Dr Lucy Johnson, Dr John Ford (Wolfson Institute of Population Health), Bethany Brown (Barts Health NHS Trust)
Young black men (YBM) are a group that experience multiple, intersectional health inequalities (Nazroo, 2003; Gilbert et al., 2016). YBM are more likely to DNA (did not attend) hospital appointments than other groups. This means there is a gap between the care that should be provided, and the care that is provided.
This project consists of a service evaluation that builds on previous exploratory work undertaken in partnership between QMUL and Barts Health NHS Trust, alongside a broader 5-year, £1.3m NIHR-funded research study on health equity and quality improvement at QMUL (EQUALQI). Working with an East London based community partner, our aim is to use a participatory photovoice methodology to understand in more detail the barriers to hospital appointment attendance for YBM. Photovoice follows the principle that ‘images teach, pictures can influence policy, and community people ought to participate in creating and defining the images that shape healthful public policy’ (Wang, 1999: 186). By using photovoice, we hope to facilitate young black men communicating the different barriers to care they experience, on their own terms.
The end goal of this project is to combine academic, community and clinical knowledge to harness the power of photovoice. We will communicate the barriers YBM face when seeking healthcare to clinicians, policymakers and other decision makers. Through this, we hope to help make access to healthcare in East London more equitable.
Feeling Futures: Supporting Transitions
Dr Maggie Inchley (School of English and Drama), Lydia Hallam (Half Moon Theatre)
Last year, the QMUL Drama Department collaborated with the local partner Half Moon Theatre to deliver Feeling Places, a psychogeography participatory project. This initiative engaged young people from schools in Tower Hamlets in creatively exploring and documenting their emotional responses to higher education spaces and identifying ways to make these environments more inclusive.
Building on this work, Feeling Futures will invite ten young people to collaborate with undergraduate and postgraduate students, along with a professional artist, in a university setting. This group will explore and share their feelings about life transitions, including those related to education, career, environment, ambitions, and emotions. QMUL Drama and the wider Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences (HSS) will partner with Half Moon Theatre, which will recruit young participants from local schools, to facilitate a series of creative workshops.
The project will culminate in a performance designed and led by the young people, potentially incorporating verbatim text, voice recordings, film, and sound. By creatively and democratically sharing experiences of navigating different life phases, this work aims to extend and enhance support for young people and young adults transitioning through various stages of education, training, and employment.
A Transformative Participatory Evaluation of the Partnership for Black People’s Health
Rosalie Hayes, Dr Megan Clinch (Wolfson Institute of Population Health), Shiraaz Sidat (Positively UK)
In the UK, Black African and Caribbean communities experience a disproportionate burden of health inequalities. Many health interventions often fail to reach them, in part because of a lack of effective involvement of Black people in research, limited employment of Black people in academia, and poor and opaque practice regarding how health data is collected and utilised in research and service development.
The Partnership for Black People’s Health seeks to address this imbalance. It is a public involvement project, funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) and led by a coalition of community organisations, activists, clinicians, and academics. It aims to strengthen and expand its existing network and identify optimal methods for involving Black communities in health services and research through a series of involvement events. The Partnership will then co-produce funding applications to develop interventions addressing the health inequalities they face.
This project is an extension to the Partnership, with the aim of conducting a participatory evaluation to provide insight into the workings of the Partnership and the involvement activities it has carried out. This will provide important learning for funders, researchers and other organisations seeking to address health inequalities through increased collaboration with and the participation of communities affected.