There’s nothing new about the idea that ordinary people know and understand their own lives in ways that social scientists (who’ve been trained to study institutions, social systems, and related phenomena from an external vantage point) are unable to perceive. Indeed, scholars in various fields have long argued that lived experience creates its own kind of “expertise,” and that researchers should seek it out, and engage with the unique perspectives and insights that individuals can share. (Similarly, organizational theorists have long called for efforts to promote “consumer involvement,” “stakeholder engagement,” and the creation of “constituent advisory boards”; see Pecora et al., 2010; Wallcraft et al., 2009).
In recent years, however, lived expertise has come to be seen as particularly valuable for researchers working to inform the design and delivery of social services, such as programs for individuals and families struggling with issues related to mental health (Barr et al., 2020; Tapsell et al., 2020; Vojtila et al., 2021), disordered eating (Musić et al., 2022), substance misuse (Honey et al., 2020; Cheng & Smith, 2009), and suicidal ideation (MacLean et al., 2018), for example.
Background
The initiative to create a 21st Century Child Welfare Research Agenda began in 2019 with an effort to identify the most pressing research questions facing the field of child and family welfare. Over the next three years, it grew to include over f ifty scholars, lived experience experts (i.e., people formerly in foster care, foster/kinship caregivers, parents impacted by child protective services), Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) consultants, policy experts, and representatives from regional and national academic and practice organizations focused on child and family welfare. Team members formed working groups to develop an initial list of over 300 research gaps relevant to the study of child and family welfare and the child welfare system.
These research gaps were unveiled in a multiday virtual Consensus Convening in 2021, which drew several hundred researchers, policymakers, practitioners, and people with lived experience from across the U.S. Input from attendees was documented and used to narrow down the initial list to a set of nineteen topics most urgently in need of research. This led to the development of nineteen Requests for Proposals (RFPs), which have been shared with a broad range of research-supporting funders, including private foundations as well as public agencies at the federal, state, county, and city levels.
Considerations and Recommendations
Below, we outline major considerations and recommendations for funders to keep in mind as they design research projects related to child and family welfare, with a focus on creating meaningful, ethically sound, and effective partnerships among researchers and members with lived expertise. Specifically, we highlight six key themes that emerged from our analysis of focus group data, survey responses, Consensus Convening chats, and conversations with partners from the broader project.