Researchers’ Attitudes to Public Involvement in Health Research

2006 Conference

The active involvement of members of the public in health research is a political priority, with many funding bodies now requiring researchers to state how the public will be involved in their research projects. There is little information about the attitudes and opinions of health researchers towards this policy and our research aims to address this gap in the knowledge.

Qualitative interviews were conducted with a purposive sample of health researchers carrying out a wide range of research projects, spanning clinical trials, health service research, population-based research and biomedical/lab based research. Interviewees were from different universities in England and Wales.

Transcripts from the interviews were thematically analysed independently by two researchers. The resulting themes will be used to develop a large-scale postal questionnaire to test the findings on a bigger sample. This presentation discusses the findings from the qualitative interviews and the implications for current policies on public involvement. By allowing health researchers to share their stories, we have learned about potential benefits and barriers to public involvement in health research from health researchers’ perspectives, and the attitudes that underpin their views.