TY - CHAP
T1 - Peer Researchers in Qualitative Research on Homelessness and Mental Health: A Reflexive Journey from Data Validity to Relations of Ethical Labour
AU - Boesveldt, Nienke
N1 - Nienke Boesveldt is a principal researcher of (partly peer-led) longitudinal research on homelessness and mental health from both service user and professional perspective at the Sociology Department of the University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands. She has published numerous academic reports and receives broad recognition for organising regularly, and for different target groups, workshops, lectures, and seminars, and for building a bridge between scientific knowledge and policy practice. With the partly peer-led data, she has published articles, including ‘Mixed Methods on Adverse Childhood Experiences predicting Transitional and Recurrent Homelessness’ (Journal of Community Psychology, 2024) with Willemijn van Dungen and Bram Orobio de Castro, ‘Governing the Homeless in the Netherlands: Incremental Change Towards Providing Housing First’ (The Routledge Handbook of Global Perspectives on Homelessness, Law & Policy, Bevan, C. (Ed.), 2023), and ‘Housing the Homeless: Shifting Sites of Managing the Poor in the Netherlands’ (Urban Studies, 2023) with Dolly Loomans
PY - 2025
Y1 - 2025
N2 - Peer research, in which people with lived experience of the phenomenon under study participate as researchers, is growing in popularity, especially in the social and health sciences. While peer research is meant to democratise knowledge-making, enhance the validity of collected data, and help to gain access to hard-to-reach populations, its mainstreaming has introduced new challenges surrounding the co-optation of lived experience. This chapter reflects on an ongoing longitudinal research project on homelessness and mental health services in the Netherlands, in which pairs of academic and peer researchers have, to date, conducted 956 interviews with people with client experience of these services. A randomised subsample of 30 interviews was coded specifically to analyse peer research methodology and its impact on data validity as well as the daily ethical dimensions of a research project involving vulnerable participants. This chapter analyses the interview strategies, including ‘self-disclosure’ and ‘establishing common ground’, of members of our research team as well as the benefits and challenges of doing peer research as they unfold in intersecting relations of ethical labour. Writing this prompted beneficial reflection on the extent to which striving for data validity is compatible with the aim of peer research to achieve social justice. While the team offers training, support, and feedback sessions to reflect on interviewing practice, is this enough? It is my hope that the additional value of peer research is evident in this chapter. Still, I wish to highlight that peer research requires additional institutional support and is not for ‘free’.
AB - Peer research, in which people with lived experience of the phenomenon under study participate as researchers, is growing in popularity, especially in the social and health sciences. While peer research is meant to democratise knowledge-making, enhance the validity of collected data, and help to gain access to hard-to-reach populations, its mainstreaming has introduced new challenges surrounding the co-optation of lived experience. This chapter reflects on an ongoing longitudinal research project on homelessness and mental health services in the Netherlands, in which pairs of academic and peer researchers have, to date, conducted 956 interviews with people with client experience of these services. A randomised subsample of 30 interviews was coded specifically to analyse peer research methodology and its impact on data validity as well as the daily ethical dimensions of a research project involving vulnerable participants. This chapter analyses the interview strategies, including ‘self-disclosure’ and ‘establishing common ground’, of members of our research team as well as the benefits and challenges of doing peer research as they unfold in intersecting relations of ethical labour. Writing this prompted beneficial reflection on the extent to which striving for data validity is compatible with the aim of peer research to achieve social justice. While the team offers training, support, and feedback sessions to reflect on interviewing practice, is this enough? It is my hope that the additional value of peer research is evident in this chapter. Still, I wish to highlight that peer research requires additional institutional support and is not for ‘free’.
KW - Expert by experience; homelessness; peer researcher; research ethics in practice; community-based research practice
UR - https://bookstore.emerald.com/reframing-qualitative-research-ethics-hb-9781836083139.html
U2 - 10.1108/S2398-601820250000012003
DO - 10.1108/S2398-601820250000012003
M3 - Chapter
SN - 9781836083139
T3 - Advances in Research Ethics and Integrity
SP - 37
EP - 56
BT - Reframing Qualitative Research Ethics
A2 - Busby, Helen
PB - Emerald Publishing Limited
CY - Leeds
ER -