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2014 20: 158Qualitative InquiryGeoffrey Nelson and Scot D. Evans

Critical Community Psychology and Qualitative Research: A Conversation  

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Qualitative Inquiry2014, Vol. 20(2) 158 –166© The Author(s) 2013Reprints and permissions: sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.navDOI: 10.1177/1077800413510873qix.sagepub.com

Article

In this article, two critical community psychologists, Geoff Nelson and Scot Evans, discuss their field and how it uses qualitative research. Geoff is a senior professor in commu-nity psychology at Wilfrid Laurier University in Canada, where he has been a faculty member since 1979. Scot Evans is a junior faculty member in the Department of Educational and Psychological Studies at the University of Miami, where he has been since 2008. Geoff and Scot were col-leagues in the community psychology program at Laurier for 2.5 years before Scot moved to Miami. Their discussion focuses on critical community psychology, qualitative research, and the intersection between the two. Geoff and Scot are sitting at a pub, each enjoying a pint, and their con-versation soon focuses on issues that are important to them.

Critical Community Psychology

Community Psychology

Scot: Geoff, how did you get your start on community psychology?

Geoff: When I was an undergraduate student at the University of Illinois in 1971, I took a course in community psychology and, concurrently, a practicum in community psychology. This was the first time these courses were offered at Illinois and the instructor was Julian Rappaport, a young professor at the time, who turned out to be one of the leaders of the field. This course had a big impact on me. It was a turning point in my life because it brought to together my political

activism and my interests in mental health into something that appeared to provide a potential career path.

Community psychology was in its early days back then; there wasn’t even a textbook yet. It was born in the context of the social changes that were occurring in the United States in the 1960s. I had been active in protests against the Vietnam war on campus and I was also supporting Black students aca-demically, who were, for the first time in the history of the university, admitted in significant numbers through a special initiative of the University of Illinois called Project 500. At the same time, I was beginning to learn through the commu-nity psychology course that public mental health services were terrible. People with lived experience of mental health issues were confined in mental hospitals and were completely excluded from community life (“out of sight”) and shoved to the margins of society. Moreover, this pattern repeated itself in the recent period of deinstitutionalization.

In the community psychology course, I learned about the contours of this emerging field. Community psychol-ogy went beyond a focus on individuals and “blaming the victim” (Ryan, 1971, a book that I read for the course) to a focus on community and ecological,

510873QIXXXX10.1177/1077800413510873Qualitative InquiryNelson and Evansresearch-article2013

1Wilfrid Laurier University, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada2University of Miami, Coral Gables, FL, USA

Corresponding Author:Geoffrey Nelson, Department of Psychology, Wilfrid Laurier University, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada N2L 3C5. Email: gnelson@wlu.ca

Critical Community Psychology and Qualitative Research: A Conversation

Geoffrey Nelson1 and Scot D. Evans2

AbstractThis article is a conversation between two critical community psychologists about the compatibility and theoretical connections between their field and qualitative research. Critical community psychology is driven by values of power-sharing and social justice, and is praxis-oriented, emphasizing solidarity with oppressed people to create transformative social change. The authors argue that qualitative research, by itself or mixed with quantitative methods, can enhance both epistemic and transformative psychopolitical validity in critical community psychology. Implications of this theoretical/methodological approach for action and social change are discussed.

Keywordscritical psychology, community psychology, qualitative research

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multilayered conceptualizations of environments. Unlike mainstream psychology, community psychology also paid attention to values and the need for a vision of how society should be transformed. Unlike clinical psychology, which had adopted the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM) deficit focus of psychiatry and which emphasized treat-ment, community psychology was concerned with compe-tence and how to prevent problems in living and promote well-being. Moreover, community psychology took a col-laborative role to working with many stakeholders in the community, rather than assuming the posture of the “expert.” However, unlike other disciplines that were beginning to make the “qualitative turn,” community psy-chology clung to the positivist natural science approach to research that dominated mainstream psychology. Since community psychology was a newcomer to psychology, I believe the field was striving to establish its respectability and credibility by doing mainstream positivist science with an emphasis on objectivity, quantification of variables, and hypothesis-testing. This is has changed more recently, but it’s taken a while.

Critical Psychology

Geoff: But enough about me, Scot. I want to know more about your background. I know you stud-ied with our mutual colleague and friend, Isaac Prilleltensky, at Peabody/Vanderbilt, where you learned not just about community psychology, but also critical psychology. Tell me about criti-cal psychology and why it has become so much a part of your identity.

Scot: Well I was lucky that Isaac came to Vanderbilt when he did. Although the Community Research and Action program at Vanderbilt was great before he got there, it was not until I met Isaac and took his Critical Psychology class that I really got informed and energized about critical theory and its application to community psy-chology theory and practice. Sadly, in my many years of schooling prior to this class, I had not been exposed much to critical theory. Critical psychology is a perspective and a practice that calls upon psychology to work towards emanci-pation and social justice, and opposes the use of psychology for the perpetuation of oppression and injustice (Fox, Prilleltensky, & Austin, 2009). While examples of psychology’s role as protectors and “legitimators” of the status quo abound (see Chamberlin, 1978, 1984; Clarke & Braun, 2009; Everett, 1994; Fox, Prilleltensky, & Austin, 2009; Huygens, 2009; Teo, 2005 to name a few) one classic example is highlighted

in a study by Caplan and Nelson (1973), where they found that 80% of psychological studies dealing with African Americans ascribed their challenges to intrapersonal inadequacies as opposed to socioeconomic circumstances. The central critical critique of psychology is that it engages in context minimization (Shinn & Toohey, 2003): the neglect of context in accounting for psychosocial problems. Critical psychologists believe that psychology has the potential to bring about a significantly better world in keeping with its ethical mandate to promote human welfare, but for a variety of rea-sons it has failed to do so. Critical psychologists consider contemporary society unjust for too many and they want to do something about it.

Isaac’s class and mentorship opened up a new world for me that helped me put names to, and frameworks around, some of the things I had been thinking about. I was actu-ally greatly influenced by the book you coauthored with Isaac called Doing Psychology Critically (Prilleltensky & Nelson, 2002). And I’m not just saying that so you’ll buy me another beer—although that would be nice. You see, I came back to graduate school after many years in the non-profit, human service sector and I was really hoping for some useful theoretical ideas to apply to human service practice. I always believed that human service practice could and should go beyond reactive, individual-level ser-vices to interventions that could have a greater impact on the social conditions that lead to human suffering, but I was devoid of any conceptual or theoretical frameworks to help me understand how to do that. What I discovered in critical psychology—and critical social theory more broadly—was a set of powerful ideas and language that provided guidance for how to construct a notion of critical human service practice that is based on critical theorizing, reflection, and a clear commitment to working for social justice through empowering and transformative practice (Henderson, 2007). How to practice critically in human service settings1 has been the primary focus of my research and action since then.

Critical Community Psychology

Geoff: Scot, I’m not quite finished with my first pint, but I’m going to order a second for us both now so that we can easily transition to the second part of the paper. I was going to do that anyway, but thanks for the props for our book on critical psy-chology. When you write these books and arti-cles, you never know how they will be received, but I always hope that at least some students will

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find them inspiring. And to know that we influ-enced you is quite humbling.

I too understand the importance of mentoring and being exposed to different worldviews. As I mentioned earlier, I was influenced by Julian Rappaport. While Julian did not use the term critical community psychology, he did have a more radical perspective on community psychology than the account I provided earlier. The first time I heard him speak was at a forum at the Illinois law school on the race and IQ controversy that came to the forefront with an article by Arthur Jensen. In his article, Jensen argued that IQ was largely genetically determined and that programs like Head Start for economically disadvantaged Black children would not work and should be abandoned. While I don’t remember the details of what Julian said in his talk, I do recall that, unlike his colleagues on the panel who talked about mea-surement issues and prejudice, he argued that psychology had a responsibility to actually do something about racism that psychology should be working to eradicate racism. When he published his textbook in community psychology a few years later (Rappaport, 1977), he explicitly high-lighted the need for a value-driven approach to community psychology, arguing for values of diversity and, later, empowerment (Rappaport, 1981). So, I think Julian did for me, what Isaac did for you: He provided a moral foundation for psychology to take action on issues of social injustice.

I have also worked very closely with Isaac, particularly when he was a junior colleague at Laurier from 1991 to 1999. I am proud to say that I was his mentor, but quick to qualify that I learned a great deal from him! When we wrote our text on community psychology (Nelson & Prilleltensky, 2010), an explicit goal was to inject a critical perspective into com-munity psychology. We sought to provide not just a contex-tual analysis of human problems but also a political analysis, in which we used the discourse of oppression and liberation. Isaac had also introduced a framework for values and social ethics, which I believed provided the foundation of a critical community psychology that disrupted the status quo of psy-chology and society (Prilleltensky, 1997). Moreover, we argued that the goals of critical community psychology should go beyond prevention and promotion of well-being to liberation from oppressive structures and processes. To do so requires community psychologists to work in solidarity with oppressed groups in an engaged praxis that unites theory, action, research, and reflection. This means that our research must be transformative, participatory, and oriented toward social change (Lykes & Mallona, 2008). Others, like Kagan, Burton, Duckett, Lawthom, and Siddiquee (2011), have also helped to define a critical community psychology.

Qualitative Research

Scot: It’s too bad that Isaac is a teetotaler. It would be great to have him in on this discussion. Perhaps

we’ll do this next time over herbal tea? So Geoff, how did you get started doing qualitative research?

Geoff: Good thing I ordered those beers, I think we’re both ready for the second round. When I was a student, training in qualitative research was nonexistent. While I had done content analysis of textual data in some traditional research proj-ects, this type of analysis still rested firmly within the paradigm of positivistic science, and I had no clue that there was an alternative inter-pretive, human science approach that was emerging. So I had to learn qualitative research on my own. Fortunately, I have a colleague, John Lord, who does participatory action research (PAR) and qualitative research with people with disabilities, all towards the goal of promoting social justice for and inclusion of people with disabilities (Lord & Hutchison, 2011). I worked on a few projects with John and he was an excellent mentor. I was also influ-enced by Lincoln and Guba’s (1985) book in which they contrasted what they called Naturalistic Inquiry with traditional positivistic science. This provided me with a more clear understanding of the nature of qualitative research. Subsequently, Lincoln, Guba (Lincoln, Lynham, & Guba, 2011) and some community psychologists (e.g., Riger, 1992) have elabo-rated the key philosophical assumptions of three research paradigms: positivist/post-positivist, social constructivist/post-modernist, and criti-cal/transformative. Each paradigm produces dif-ferent types of knowledge: empirical/analytical, experiential/hermeneutic, and critical/emanci-patory (Habermas, 1971). While I don’t find that the positivist paradigm is a good fit with qualita-tive research, I do believe that the paradigm of pragmatism, which has not made it into the tables of Lincoln et al. and others, is a useful one for qualitative and mixed methods research.

Constructivist Paradigm

Geoff: I want you to tell me about your connection to qualitative research, Scot. I know that during your interview for the faculty position at Laurier, you said you were a qualitative researcher.

Scot: I’d say that it’s generally true that I feel comfort-able in constructivist clothing, although with a critical-transformative blazer like the one I’m wearing right now. I guess I wandered into this paradigm during my master’s training in human development counseling. I had a very negative reaction to my first exposure to the DSM and its

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pseudo-objective pathologizing of people’s problems in living. I quickly did a left turn in the direction of constructivist approaches such as narrative therapy and its grounding in the post-modern notion that there is no one objective “truth” and that there are many multiple possible interpretations of lived experience. Meaning or truth, I came to understand, is always a human construction. And of course that statement I just made—that’s a human construction, so take it for what its worth.

Later, when I began doing research on human service organizations I came to appreciate that my research with organizations was simply an attempt to gain a deep under-standing of organizational phenomena as people in that spe-cific context experience them. I felt the best way to do that was to join with them, to talk with them, to interact in ways that allowed me to gain insight into how, individually and collectively, they made meaning from their experience. Grounded in the constructivist paradigm, I understand that research itself is far from value free, and that values are all entangled in research participants’ constructions of experi-ence. And that’s ok as long as we acknowledge this and attend to values as part of our research and analysis.

I have to tell you though; it wasn’t easy for me initially to do this type of research. I had to shake off some pretty heavy indoctrination. In graduate school, most of the research methodology I was exposed to had a positivist/quantitative bent with very little critical examination of the underlying ontology and epistemology. The message I was getting from some was that if I wasn’t using multilevel vari-ables, scales, and sophisticated analyses, my research was not as rigorous as it should be. If it wasn’t for the one quali-tative course I took—and the good fortune to have some fellow students around me who challenged the dominant paradigm that we were being socialized into—I might not be doing research at all right now.

As I make sense of it, research grounded in the construc-tivist paradigm is guided by the assumption that there is no singular, universal reality (ontology), we come to know things in relationship with others (epistemology), and that values are included and assumptions are on the table for discussion (ideology). Under this paradigm, qualitative methodologies such as narrative research, grounded theory, and discourse analysis serve our best strategies for making sense of the world.

Pragmatist Paradigm

Scot: I know you still do some quantitative research. You’ve even asked some of your students to quantitatively code some people’s personal nar-ratives. What’s up with that?!

Geoff: OK, time for a sip of beer before I answer that one. Is that what they call “a loaded question”?

Most of my research uses participatory approaches to evaluate complex community interventions for people who are on the margins of society, including community-based prevention programs for children and families and housing and self-help programs for people who are homeless and have lived experience of mental health issues (Nelson, Goering, & Tsemberis, 2012; Nelson, Janzen, Ochocka, & Trainor, 2010; Peters et al., 2010). I have found that mixed methods approaches that combine qualitative and quantita-tive methods provide the best fit for this type of evaluation research that I conduct in partnership with people who are disadvantaged (Greene, 2008). Mixed methods approaches are rooted in the pragmatist paradigm (Morgan, 2007). One of the founders of the pragmatist school of thought, John Dewey, emphasized the importance of values, especially democracy, and practice in the conduct of educational reform and problem-based and experiential learning (Dewey, 1916). This idea of value-based action research interventions resonates well with me and, I think, critical community psychology. As Morgan (2007) has pointed out, in the pragmatist approach, philosophical assumptions about ontology and epistemology take a back seat to values and methodological issues in the creation and evaluation of interventions that strive to make social change.

Rather than favoring deduction (positivism) or induction (constructivism), pragmatism espouses abduction. “The pragmatic approach is to rely on a version of abductive rea-soning that moves back and forth between induction and deduction—first converting observations into theories and then assessing those theories through action” (Morgan, 2007, p. 71). And rather than favoring objectivity (positiv-ism) or subjectivity (constructivism), pragmatism empha-sizes intersubjectivity. “In a pragmatic approach, there is no problem with asserting both that there is a single ‘real world’ and that all individuals have their own unique inter-pretations of that world” (Morgan, 2007, p. 72). Finally, rather than favoring universal laws (positivism) or context-dependent knowledge (constructivism), pragmatism emphasizes what Lincoln and Guba (1985) have called “transferability.” “We cannot simply assume that our meth-ods and our approach to research makes our results either context-bound or generalizable; instead, we need to investi-gate the factors that affect whether the knowledge we gain can be transferred to other settings” (Morgan, 2007, p. 72). Pragmatism offers an alternative approach to positivism and constructivism for those of us who are more driven by a focus on interventions designed to bring about social change, than by the ontological and epistemological assumptions of paradigms.

Scot: Well ok, I think I buy that. I can certainly get behind the idea that we shouldn’t get too bogged-down by the philosophical or methodological

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assumptions of paradigms—what Chamberlain (2000) refers to as “methodolatry”—and instead get to work using whatever methods are neces-sary to promote action. I guess what I worry about is engaging in research that generates practical knowledge and action but does nothing to contribute to change in the status quo. I still have questions about whether or not pragmatism has anything to offer to the researcher who wants action research to spur not just any action, but transformative action. For example, in my own research with community organizations, I worry that privileging action over critical reflection on action leads to organizational or system improve-ments but leaves the oppressive system as a whole unchanged. The risk of the pragmatic approach is that without adequate reflection, dia-logue, and consciousness-raising, one may be co-opted by dominant interests and thus unable to recognize subjugating powers (Freire, 2000; Johansson & Lindhult, 2008).

Transformative Paradigm

Geoff: That’s a good point. Even though our approaches to qualitative research may be somewhat differ-ent, I think we both share that larger concern that qualitative research should serve a critical, transformative, social justice agenda. (Scot raises his glass in agreement.) I don’t think con-structivism or pragmatism necessarily have a transformative agenda. Constructivism could be limited to making meaning but not making social change, and pragmatism could be liberal-reformist in nature without challenging social structures and processes to make more funda-mental transformative change. For me, the criti-cal, transformative paradigm provides a much-needed alternative or addition to the con-structivist and pragmatist paradigms.

In Habermas’s (1971) view, there is an external reality that has evolved through history and consists of social and historical structures and processes, and researchers must work in solidarity with oppressed groups to transform knowledge and social structures and processes (Lykes & Mallona, 2008). Moreover, transformative change is value-driven, and researchers need to be self-reflexively aware of their values and privilege (Nelson & Prilleltensky, 2010). Understanding one’s standpoint and reflexively engaging with people who are marginalized are ways “of attending to the institutional location of the historical and personal aspects of the research relationship” (Parker, 2005, p. 25).

As you said, Scot, if change agents are not reflexively aware of their standpoints, they are prone to settle for ameliorative change that does not challenge social injustice. They assume the roles of what Goldenberg (1978) has called “social tech-nicians” or “social reformers,” rather than transformative “social interventionists.” Finally, in the transformative par-adigm, research is participatory and action-oriented (Lykes & Mallona, 2008). The transformative paradigm is all about emancipation from oppression.

What do you think, Scot?

Scot: You don’t have to feed me beer to convince me of that line of thinking. This is the type of research that really energizes me. These days I’m not really interested in participating in research that does not serve these ends. I’m reminded of Kincheloe and McLaren’s (1998) notion of the criticalist: “A researcher or theorist who attempts to use her work as a form of social or cultural criticism and who accepts certain basic assump-tions that all thought is fundamentally mediated by power relations that are social and historically constituted” (p. 263). Beyond just critique, how-ever, they also endorse the need for emancipatory actions that lead to increased social justice and social transformation (Kincheloe & McLaren, 1994). Critical-transformative research strives for social critique and actions that would increase the possibilities for social justice-oriented soci-etal transformation.

Linking Critical Community Psychology and Critical Qualitative Research

Geoff: Scot, I share your impulse for action, which, I think, is one of the links between critical com-munity psychology and critical qualitative research. I have a hunch that Isaac’s concept of psychopolitical validity might help us to enhance those theoretical links. You were at the event in which Isaac launched his idea about psychopolitical validity (Prilleltensky, 2008). Can you talk about that?

Psychopolitical Validity: Epistemic and Transformative

Scot: Leave it to Isaac to come up with a concept like psychopolitical validity, eh? Just the way it sounds rolling out of his mouth makes me want to buy stock in it. I see this concept as his chal-lenge to community psychologists to put power

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issues at the forefront of research and action. As he explains it, psychopolitical validity refers to

the extent to which studies and interventions in the community integrate (a) knowledge with respect to the multidisciplinary and multilevel sources, experiences, and consequences of oppression, and (b) effective strategies for promoting psychological and political liberation in the personal, relational, and collective domains. (Prilleltensky, 2003, p. 199)

Research and action should account for and address power dynamics at both psychological and political levels.

You can hear two dimensions at work in his definition above: epistemic and transformative. He uses the term epis-temic psychopolitical validity to suggest that research should help elucidate the role of power in the psychology and politics of wellness, oppression and liberation, at the personal, relational, and collective domains. For example, research in the relational domain examines “the role of power in creating and sustaining egalitarian relationships, social cohesion, social support, respect for diversity, and democratic participation in communities, groups, and fami-lies” (Prilleltensky, 2008, p. 131).

Transformative psychopolitical validity exists when our social interventions go beyond amelioration to promote structural change. “Transformational validity derives from the potential of our actions to promote personal, relational, and collective wellness by reducing power inequalities and increasing political action” (Prilleltensky, 2008, p. 130). In practice, these actions might focus on interventions such as empowerment and sociopolitical development (personal level); building trust, connection, and participation in groups that support social justice (relational level); and social action to support networks of resistance (collective level). Taken together Isaac’s concept of psychopolitical validity has some similarities to Lather’s (1993) notion of catalytic validity in that both are concerned with research that increases our understanding of the world in order to transform it.

In offering up this notion of psychopolitical validity, Isaac is challenging the field of community psychology to focus or redirect our research and action toward understand-ing, exposing, and transforming power inequalities. To him, it’s a matter of examining priorities.

If we continue to use our limited community psychology resources only to ameliorate conditions and to tend to the wounded, who will work to transform the very conditions that create exploitation and distress in the first place? (Prilleltensky, 2008, p. 132)

Qualitative Research Paradigms

Scot: But how does that help us with understanding the theoretical intersection between critical community psychology and critical qualitative research? I don’t understand where you’re

going with that idea. It may just be this tasty, but strong local brew messing with my ability to think clearly.

Geoff: I was recalling our discussions about paradigms of qualitative research and thinking that perhaps the transformative paradigm might underlie and be integrated with both the constructivist and pragmatist paradigms. These blended paradigms then both share a natural affinity with epistemic and transformative psychopolitical validity. So what, Scot, would be the connection between a transformative constructivism, if you can con-ceive of that, and the two dimensions of psycho-political validity?

Transformative constructivism

Scot: Ah ok, let me see if I can play this out. I might need to order some food; are you hungry too?

Geoff: Why don’t they ever have any good food offer-ings for us vegetarians at these pubs? Do you think they have hummus and pita?

Scot: Anyway, how might the epistemic and transfor-mative types of psychopolitical validity be inte-grated with the constructivist paradigm? Well it seems to me that engaging in qualitative research guided by epistemic psychopolitical validity could surely take the form of research aimed at amplifying the voices of marginalized people. In liberation psychology there is this practice of “accompaniment” that is described as “a process of walking alongside, listening to and witness-ing the realities of the loves of people living in poverty” (Kagan et al., 2011, p. 224). Our quali-tative research can demonstrate epistemic psychopolitical validity and contribute to trans-formation when we accompany, listen to, and amplify the voices of marginalized people who might not be otherwise heard.

While there are numerous examples of this type of work in community psychology (Hanlin et al., 2007), I can give one modest example of this from some research I conducted with a group young people in Nashville, Tennessee (Evans, 2007). These teenagers from a low-income neighborhood in East Nashville were brought together by a youth organization to learn about and address problems in their schools and neighborhood. I initially joined them as an evaluator to help the organiza-tion learn about and articulate the benefits of their efforts, but as my time with them grew longer and I came to be seen as an ally, these young people began sharing with me their personal and collective experiences of powerless-ness. What I was hearing over and over again were stories about limited opportunities to have any voice or influence in their schools and community. My qualitative research

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through active participation, interviews, and focus groups centered on these stories that were later highlighted in an evaluation report and used by the youth and their support-ing organization to tell their stories and build the case for a youth-led research project focused on the inequities in student experiences across the school system in Nashville.

So it makes sense to me that we can use qualitative research to amplify marginalized voices and experiences of powerlessness and be granted epistemic psychopolitical validity. Activist qualitative research and evaluation guided by transformative psychopolitical validity adds the social action component. Photovoice is a pretty good example of a qualitative approach that allows marginalized groups to record and represent their everyday realities, engage in crit-ical dialogue about these realities, and use this analysis to take action (Wang, 2006). The dialogue spurred by the images people use to represent their lives helps to raise awareness about their experiences and the conditions that constrain their well-being. Based on their analysis of these stories, photovoice participants consider, and seek to act upon, the social, and political conditions that contribute to personal and community problems (Wang, Morrel-Samuels, Hutchison, Bell, & Pestronk, 2004). Photovoice is a qualita-tive approach that exemplifies both epistemic and transfor-mative psychopolitical validity. A crucial component of this type of research involves critical reflection and critical analysis aided by the research process.

And how would this work for transformative pragmatism?

Transformative pragmatism

Geoff: Like you, I think I can best talk about transforma-tive pragmatism through an example of current research in which I’m involved. I am the co-lead for the qualitative research on a research demon-stration project, At Home/Chez Soi, for homeless people with lived experience of mental health issues in five Canadian cities (Nelson et al., 2012). Like any research demonstration project, the goal of the research is examine the effective-ness of an intervention and then to translate that knowledge into further action, such as changing policy or promoting the “uptake” of the interven-tion. The project is based on the Housing First approach, which, in contrast to the dominant treatment-first approach, does not require people to be sober or in treatment for mental health or substance use issues. People are provided with housing first, and they are free to take or leave mental health treatment, although almost every-one takes treatment because they are treated like people rather than as DSM diagnoses.

In terms of epistemic psychopolitical validity, we want to understand the experiences and narratives of participants

in this research demonstration project through qualitative research. At baseline, we have interviewed more than 200 people to ask them about their experiences of life on the streets, their experiences with services, and how they became homeless. To this end, we have a qualitative research team analyzing these interviews, an indepen-dent research team of people with lived experience doing their own analyses, the National Film Board of Canada, which has been contracted to do both a feature length documentary and 50 short stories of people participating in the project, and we are going to compare these narra-tive data with some of the quantitative measures. So I think we’ll get a pretty well-rounded picture.

In terms of transformative psychopolitical validity, we are interviewing participants 18 months after baseline to under-stand changes that they have experienced as a result of obtain-ing housing through the program. These narrative outcome data will provide an important complement to the quantitative measures that are being used. We believe that the narratives will provide a richer and deeper account of the outcomes of the project and their meaning for those who have participated in it. There’s more, but those are some of the highlights.

The approach that we are taking in this research is, I think, a good example of the type of mixed methods prag-matism described by Morgan (2007), but it is also transfor-mative at several different levels (Nelson, 2010). First, the philosophy of Housing First, which provides the basis for At Home/Chez Soi, is transformative in espousing princi-ples of consumer choice and separation of housing and treatment. By providing participants with rent subsidies, people with mental health issues can choose an apartment from housing that is typically available in the community, rather than being forced to live in a specialized program with on-site treatment staff and other residents who also have mental health issues. The relationship between people with mental health issues and treatment staff also has the potential to be transformed, because treatment is guided by the principles of recovery and power-sharing. That is, the focus is not on people’s illnesses or deficits, but on how they can reach their potential as active agents, rather than as passive clients. Finally, another goal of the project is to transform mental health and housing services, not just in the five cities, but across Canada and beyond. Knowledge exchange strategies with housing and service providers, mental health professionals, planners, policymakers, politi-cians, and the public are an important part of this project (Nelson et al., 2012). We are already collaborating with col-leagues in France and Portugal who have embarked upon similar demonstration projects.

Conclusion

Scot: Geoff, that is some impressive work you’re doing. I really like how the work has transfor-mative potential at multiple levels of analysis. I

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think what you have described is blend of criti-cal community psychology and a critical trans-formative paradigm on qualitative research. This discussion has helped me begin to see that the epistemological variance between critical theory and pragmatism may not be as problem-atic as I thought. You’ve convinced me that research can be both critical and practical using multiple methods as long as the voices and interpretations of marginalized individuals and groups are privileged. I’m reminded of how Kemmis and McTaggart (2005) define PAR as practical, critical, and emancipatory. They don’t exclude quantitative approaches from PAR on methodological grounds as long as rigid objec-tivism is left behind. Their construction of PAR fits nicely into the transformative pragmatist paradigm.

I think where we’ve landed is with the idea that research in critical community psychology is value-based, participatory, critical, and prag-matic. While the constructivist paradigm cer-tainly informs our work more than positivism or post-positivism, and qualitative methods do a better job of lifting up people’s voices and per-spectives, quantitative methods might also help us move toward action. I’m often moved by effective descriptive quantitative research that paints dramatic pictures of problematic social conditions like income inequality2 or the gender wage gap, for example. And of course as you mentioned earlier, mixed methods approaches can certainly be effectively used for transforma-tive ends. What would you add to my somewhat fuzzy attempt at making meaning from all this?

Geoff: I think what we get out of these dialogues, Scot, is the opportunity to exchange ideas, and I value that. If the discussion leads to some meeting of the minds—great, but I’m also OK to have con-tinuing debates and disagreements, since we are critical friends. Who knows what we will think tomorrow or whether in the future we’ll reflect back about how we missed something very basic. And who knows how we’ll feel tomorrow, especially if you finally buy us one last round. Should we take some aspirin and drink some water for prevention, and of more immediate importance, who’s going to drive?

Scot: Not me! Taxi!

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Notes

1. Human services include health, education, and social services.

2. See http://motherjones.com/politics/2011/02/income-inequality-in-america-chart-graph and http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/video/2011/nov/16/99-v-1-occupy-data-animation for some great visual examples of descriptive quantitative research used to raise awareness of income and wealth inequal-ity in the United States.

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Author Biographies

Geoffrey Nelson is a professor of psychology in the Community Psychology program at Wilfrid Laurier University. He is recipient of the Harry V. McNeill Award for Innovation in Community Mental Health in 1999 and the Distinguished Contribution to Community Psychology Theory and Research Award in 2013 from the Society for Community Research and Action of the American Psychological Association.

Scot Evans is an assistant professor in the Department of Educational and Psychological Studies in the School of Education at the University of Miami. He received his PhD in Community Research and Action at Peabody College of Vanderbilt University and his Master’s degree in Human Development Counseling also from Vanderbilt. Dr. Evans’s current scholarly interests include researching and promoting the role of community-based human service organizations in the promotion of wellbeing, social change, and social justice.

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