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Rights-based narrative research with children and young people conducted

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Patricia McNamara
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DOI: 10.1177/1473325011428538

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Article
Qualitative Social Work
12(2) 135–152
Rights-based narrative ! The Author(s) 2011
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DOI: 10.1177/1473325011428538

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over time1,2
Patricia McNamara
La Trobe University, Australia

Abstract
Narrative research conducted over time creates opportunities for the co-creation of
knowledge about the lived experience of children and young people as they grow and
change. This article revisits two Australian studies with young people confronted by
difficult mental health and welfare circumstances who have been successfully engaged in
narrative research over substantial periods of time. Rights-based critique of these stud-
ies from a collective standpoint of inclusion, participation, empowerment and advocacy
illustrates both opportunity and challenge. A set of research principles is distilled
from this critique to inform rights-based longitudinal narrative studies with children
and young people.

Keywords
Children’s research, longitudinal, narrative, rights-based

Background
The twentieth anniversary of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the
Child (adopted in November, 1989) re-focussed Australian and international atten-
tion on rights-based approaches to research with children and young people
(www.aracy.org.au; www.isci09.com). Bessell (2009) identifies the following
Articles of the Convention as especially pertinent to the development of respectful
approaches to child and adolescent research:

Article 12: Children’s right to express opinions on matters concerning them

Article 13: Children’s right to express their views in the way they wish
Article 33: Children’s right to the highest quality services, including research

Corresponding author:
Patricia McNamara, Department of Social Work and Social Policy, School of Allied Health, Faculty of Health
Sciences, La Trobe University, 3086 Melbourne, Australia
Email: p.mcnamara@latrobe.edu.au
136 Qualitative Social Work 12(2)

Article 36: Children’s right to protection from all forms of exploitation, including
protection from exploitation through research processes and through dissemi-
nation of information
Article 31: Right to rest and leisure

A review of best practice models for engaging children and young people in
social research suggests that the United Kingdom leads the way (Noble-Carr,
2006). The UK literature published within this domain is prolific and appears
resultant, in part at least, from the Economic and Social Research Council’s
‘Children 5–16 Research Programme’ (Prout, 2002). Mary Kellett and her col-
leagues at the Open University’s Children’s Research Centre have also been
highly influential in promoting child empowering research (Australian Research
Alliance for Children and Youth, 2011; Kellett, 2005; Kellett, 2010).
There are, however, many studies now that illustrate internationally the diversity
of topics successfully investigated with active participation of children. It is encour-
aging to identify research with children and/or young people’s participation focus-
ing on:

. Out-of-home care and child protection systems (Aubrey and Dahl, 2006; Mason,
Urquhart and Bolzan, 2003; O’Neill, 2004)
. Homelessness (Edwards, 2003; Jurak, 2003)
. Crime (Pain et al., 2002)
. Adolescent mental health (McNamara 2008b)
. Mental illness (Alakus, 2004)
. Family relationships (McNamara 2006; McNamara 2010)
. Trauma (Frederico, Jackson and Black, 2010)
. Perceptions of problems and coping strategies (Punch, 2002a)
. Illness and pain (Kortesluoma, Hentinen & Nikkonen, 2003)
. Poverty (Ridge, 2003)
. Respite services for children with a disability (Save the Children, 2001)
. How children negotiate independence in rural Bolivia (Punch, 2002b)
. Violence against children (Laws and Mann, 2004)
. Children and risk (Harden et al., 2000)

Adapted from Noble-Carr (2006)

Attendant to the proliferation of research projects engaging children and ado-

lescents, is the quest for ethically defensible rights-based methods for undertaking
such research; this is manifest in current discourse around children’s research in
Australia (Australian Research Alliance for Children and Youth, 2011). The con-
temporary Australian focus on rights has given rise to this article, which presents
the author’s ongoing search for collaborative participatory approaches to narrative
research with young people over time. Two of my own studies are appraised from a
rights-based standpoint to exemplify the opportunities and the challenges
McNamara 137

associated with children’s research in contemporary Australia. A set of principles

for conducting research in this domain is then proposed; it is suggested that these
principles have potential for international application.

Conceptual framework
The philosophical orientation of rights-based research about, with and by children
and young people, aligns closely with the collective standpoint of inclusion, partic-
ipation, empowerment, and advocacy. Together, these perspectives would seem to
constitute cornerstones of a rights-based framework for children’s research. They are
clearly highly congruent with social work’s mission, especially the profession’s
social justice and human rights imperatives (International Federation of Social
Workers [IFSW], 2000, 2002). Such an orientation ideally underpins all social
work best practice, education and research (Adams, 2008).
Inclusion in relation to children’s research, implies respectful and proactive invi-
tation to children and young people to collaborate in the choice of research topic,
development of research design, choice of methodology and strategies for data
collection, analysis of findings and dissemination (Gilbertson and Barber, 2002;
IFSW, 2002). Inclusion privileges respect for children as ‘competent human beings’
who can make choices about both the nature of their involvement and every aspect
of the research process, rather than viewing children as ‘developmentally incom-
plete’, passive (sometimes oppressed) research subjects (Mason and Urquhart,
2001).
Participation of children in research is very different from ‘tokenistic’ involve-
ment with children (Kellett, 2010). Once engaged in the research process, it is vital
that children and young people maintain active agency throughout (Adams, 2008;
Ife, 2001; IFSW, 2002; Mason and Urquhart, 2001). Participation can occur at a
range of levels; research by children well trained in research skills (including skills
of collecting peer-to-peer and adult data), undertaking their own studies with adult
support, is probably the highest level of participation (Kellett, 2010).
Empowerment of children throughout a research process means that children feel
in control of their level of participation (or of the choice not to participate) and the
decisions being made in relation to the study; they should also feel confident that
their trust in adults and in the research process itself (especially around confiden-
tiality) will not be abused (Adams, 2008; IFSW, 2002). This is ideally comple-
mented by their experiencing the positive impact of research findings in
challenging unhelpful beliefs about young people and making changes in their
lived experience through improvements in policy and practice. It is obviously
important, however, that children’s expectations of such change not be raised
unrealistically (Kellett, 2010).
Advocacy should be undertaken by adults on behalf of children participating in
research to protect their welfare and advance their right to assert control; adults
can also advocate for children’s rights to access information and for their involve-
ment in dissemination of research findings. Adults can advocate for the
138 Qualitative Social Work 12(2)

implementation of research findings that impact on children’s lives. However, if

children are empowered and do feel convinced that they are indeed ‘experts on their
own lives’ (Mason and Urquhart, 2001) they will often be able to engage in advo-
cacy themselves, with adult support.

Rights-based narrative research

Narrative research is characterized by co-construction of meaning through semi-
structured or unstructured discourse; it privileges the voices of participants and
dissemination of lived experience through thick description and storytelling
(McNamara, 2009; McNamara and Neve, 2009). When it has a rights-based ori-
entation, narrative research actively promotes inclusion, participation, empower-
ment and advocacy. Narrative rights-based research has positioned itself centrally
in the spectrum of contemporary research approaches over the past decade
(Kellett, 2010; McNamara, 2009; McNamara and Neve, 2009; Munford and
Sanders, 2003; Noble-Carr, 2006). Theoretically and methodologically, rights-
based narrative research with children and young people appears to derive much
from the constructivist practice literature (Boscolo and Cecchin, 1987; White and
Epston, 1990) and from phenomenology (Corbin and Strauss, 2008); it also has
synergy with participant action research approaches (Munford and Sanders, 2003;
Wadsworth, 1998). Rights-based narrative longitudinal research with young people
conducted over time creates opportunities to explore developmental issues; the
genre enables critical developmental transitions to be explored through each
young person’s own lens and explained in her/his own voice.

Two studies with young people

Two of my own longitudinal narrative studies are presented as examples of the
ongoing journey towards a rights-based approach. There are clearly limitations
associated with both the number of studies explored and with the choice taken to
focus primarily on my own research material. I believe both decisions are, however,
justified by the depth of reflection made possible herein by adopting this approach.
Both studies have been underpinned by an ecological-developmental frame of
reference (Bronfenbrenner, 1979); in each instance, data has been collected over
substantial periods of time. Both studies incorporated constructivist and feminist
concepts originally emergent from the family therapy literature (Boscolo and
Cecchin, 1987; Hare-Mustin, 1978; Luepnitz, 1988; White and Epston, 1990).
The first is a fifteen year longitudinal study of former adolescent residents in a
psychiatric unit (McNamara, 2000; McNamara, 2008b). In this study, young
people aged 12 to 18 years at admission, participated in semi-structured inter-
views at five points in time over fifteen years (Stage One – admission, discharge
and six months post-discharge; Stage Two – seven years post discharge and
Stage Three – fifteen years post discharge). This research focused on the ecologi-
cal-developmental systems processes operating around each of the young people
McNamara 139

and in which they were active participants. It aimed to identify strengths and dif-
ficulties in both systemic transactions and developmental processes; it piloted a
package of semi-structured instruments for conducting ecological-
developmental assessments in child and adolescent mental health settings. The
instruments elicit information from young people and their parents, along with
teachers, nurses and therapists in clinics and within the community.
The second, more recent project, exemplifies the challenges and the possibilities of
participatory action research with young people and their families in a community-
based child and family centre. The aim of that study was to identify proximal steps
toward larger outcomes of intervention. I conducted this Melbourne-based research
as part of a cross-national study involving six countries – Australia, Canada, Israel,
New Zealand, United Kingdom and the United States (Berry et al., 2006;
McNamara, 2006; McNamara, 2010) within an eighteen month time frame.
During this period, the young people in the research family (aged 13 and 16 years)
participated firstly in a background briefing session, then in family therapy sessions
which were observed and videotaped; they also participated in occasional unstruc-
tured conversations (telephone and face-to-face) and two semi-structured home-
based research conversations – the second of which they filmed using equipment
provided by my university; the young people also agreed to presentation of both the
study and their film at a research conference in New York (McNamara, 2006).
A general inductive approach for analysis of qualitative data (Thomas, 2003) was
used in both studies. Interviews were audio recorded and fully transcribed. Data
were categorized according to themes that emerged from conversation content.
I developed a number of categories that encapsulated phenomenological themes
related to the research aims (Padgett, 1998; Punch, 2006) and identified responses
that could be located within thematic frames that occurred and recurred (Punch,
2006). These themes were then analysed using links both to the literature and to
practice wisdom (Scott, 1990).

Opportunities and challenges

Both opportunity and challenge exist for the researcher undertaking longitudinal
narrative studies with young people. Issues I have identified from my own research
experience include ideology, ethics, recruitment, agency, maturation and change,
culture and language, gender and dissemination. These are critically examined here
in relation to the four cornerstone concepts of the suggested rights-based framework
for research with children and young people – empowerment, inclusion, participation
and advocacy.

Ideology
Both the adolescent mental health study and the cross national study of sensitive/
proximal outcomes in child and family welfare employed collaborative narrative
research methods increasingly over time. The studies aimed to make a difference at
140 Qualitative Social Work 12(2)

micro, meso, exo and macro system levels (Bronfenbrenner, 1979). In each
instance, most participants have spontaneously reported their experience of partic-
ipation as empowering; their research engagement seemingly advanced the advo-
cacy activities of some adolescent/young adult participants who lobbied Australian
governments at state and federal levels to improve welfare and mental health
resource allocation. This would appear consistent with a ‘children’s movements’
orientation to research where children are understood as ‘experts in their own lives’
(Mason and Urquart, 2001)
However, retrospective analysis of both studies also reveals elements of what
must be acknowledged an essentially ‘adultist’ orientation (Mason and
Urquhart, 2001). From the ‘gate-keeping’ by parents and caregivers along
with choice of research design and data collection methods to dissemination
of findings, the locus of power was clearly with the adults involved. In the
latter stages of the first study I shifted position to a more inclusive and par-
ticipatory stance (Adams, 2008; Ife, 2001; Rubin and Babbie, 2008); it must be
acknowledged, however, that the shift was probably more developmentally
than ideologically driven. This was exemplified by participant checking of
data, undertaken by former adolescent in-patients who had become young
adults in most instances by Stage Two and were parents themselves in some
cases by Stage Three.
In the second project, more collaborative approaches were employed from the
outset, such as the young people’s participation in decision-making about the
timing, nature and recording of research conversations (Marr and Maloney,
2007). However, the adults who designed the second study included researchers
from several countries who did not consult with young people at all (Kellett, 2010).
Despite their exclusion from critical decision making, the adolescent participants
magnanimously accommodated the status quo and were apparently excited by the
prospect of engaging in global research. Notwithstanding the superficial success of
this international collaboration, I would, in future, advocate strongly for a rights-
based approach from the outset.
Ideological challenges associated with rights-based research with children
and young people are not inconsequential. Inclusivity and participation are
not easily achieved (ARACY, 2009; Bessell, 2009; Spriggs, 2009). Child and
adolescent research participants often bring with them narratives of trauma,
abuse and exclusion (Frederico, Jackson and Black, 2010). That was certainly
true of almost all participants in the two studies cited here. These young
people were not familiar with being asked what they thought about their sit-
uation or what they felt might make a difference for them and for others in
similar circumstances. They also had no experience of advocacy on their behalf
or of the opportunity to self-advocate. I learned to proactively utilize inclusion,
participation and advocacy strategies with some success though this research;
however, I also needed to take care not to raise unrealistic expectations of
policy or practice change.
McNamara 141

Ethics
I have experienced the ethical challenges associated with children’s research from
dual perspectives, firstly as a researcher and, more recently, as a university based
ethics reviewer. It would appear that in Australia, over the past decade there has
been a thawing of the chilly reception so often afforded ethics applications related
to research with children and young people. Some monitoring bodies appear to
have embraced an understanding that young people must be afforded appropriate
levels of agency; children are understood to be competent to make decisions
regarding research participation, as long as respectful and competent guidance is
in place and protection of their rights is assured (Australian Research Council,
2010, National Health and Medical Research Council, 2007). Better developed
advice is now accessible to Australian researchers, which appears to have increased
the number of ethically defensible proposals to conduct children’s research receiv-
ing approval (ARACY, 2009, 2010; Spriggs, 2010). The mental health project with
adolescents described herein certainly confronted more ethical ‘challenges’ over its
fifteen year history than has the more recent child and family welfare study. Cross-
nationally, across the six countries involved, the latter research exemplifies a grow-
ing acceptance of the importance of research with children and young people and
an understanding that all stakeholders must work together responsibly to make this
a reality.
Challenges faced by researchers still include that of over-zealous gate-keeping by
ethicists, service managers and, sometimes, even parents/caregivers; this can silence
children and young people. Under-vigilance, of course, can result in failure to
protect children’s rights to privacy and direct harm (IFSW, 2002). Children and
young people can be asked to confront past or current abuse, for example, which
may expose them to further trauma (Gilbertson and Barber, 2002; Mahon et al.,
1996). In longitudinal research children and young people can feel trapped by
invitations to re-visit trauma again (and sometimes, yet again) (Frederico,
Jackson and Black, 2010; Hill, Laybourn and Borland, 1996). Researchers are
bound by advocacy and duty of care responsibilities associated with their status
in loco parentis (McNamara, 2005; Spriggs, 2009). In Australia, as in many other
countries, there is legislation in place to protect especially vulnerable populations
such as young people on guardianship orders, indigenous youth and incarcerated
or refugee minors (NHMRC-ARC, 2010). One international example of the legal
requirements regarding children’s research is the US Department of Health and
Human Services Human Research Protections for children (http://www.hhs.gov/
ohrp/policy/populations/children.html accessed 17th July, 2011).
In relation to the often pivotal issue of ‘gate-keeping’, it is important for
researchers to be aware of circumstances when parental consent may not be
required/appropriate (for example when a child has been subject to abuse or
neglect); it may be acceptable to seek consent ‘from another person who has
responsibility for the young person’s safety security and wellbeing’ (Spriggs,
2009: 5).
142 Qualitative Social Work 12(2)

It is important to differentiate assent from consent in inclusive, participatory and

empowering research with children and young people; in Australia the former is an
informal agreement, whilst the latter has standing under law and can only be given
once the young person has reached adult status (Spriggs, 2010). In the longitudinal
mental health study, parental consent was sought in the first instance along with the
young person’s assent. As these young people achieved adult status, formal consent
in their own right was sought. Other key ethical issues include the need for statu-
tory clearances for researchers working with children and transparency around
limits to confidentiality in relation to risk to the young person or to others in
the community (Noble-Carr, 2006).

Recruitment
Young people (especially young children) are often given little power over impor-
tant decision-making that impacts upon them, including engagement (or not) in
research. In conducting both of the studies described here, I found it helpful to
discuss implications of the research with young people without others (especially
adults) present, in order to minimize potential duress. I stressed the amount of their
time that would be involved and the kinds of issues to be explored in very concrete
terms. Children and young people also often find it hard to withdraw once their
involvement has commenced. It was made clear to the young people in these studies
that withdrawal at any point was completely acceptable prior to processing of data
in preparation for dissemination of findings. However, in retrospect, I feel that the
first study, being initiated within a hospital setting, might have unintentionally
aligned with ‘medical model duress’. This may have led to ‘over-compliance’, at
Stage One, especially. However, four young people of the original sample of eight
participants in the mental health research did choose not to re-engage later – two
each at the seven and fifteen year follow-up points respectively. Duress was less
likely, perhaps, within the empowerment oriented family centre chosen for the child
welfare research. In that study, a number of families with young people declined
involvement; one older adolescent member of the recruited family chose not to
engage.

Agency
It would appear that the skills of maximizing inclusion and participation through
achieving real agency of child and adolescent research participants emerge in large
measure from the emotional intelligence of the researcher (Morrison, 2007).
Morrison makes a convincing case for developing positive affect as a means of
maximizing participation with professionals. Combined with reflection and reflex-
ivity (Schon, 1983) positive affect seems intrinsic to conduct of effective research
with children and young people. In some instances (for example, in research under-
taken by experienced social work clinicians) the researcher presents with advanced
interpersonal helping skills and practice wisdom (Scott, 1990). This can often result
McNamara 143

in a high standard of practice in narrative, descriptive, rights-based research meth-

ods. Where clinical skills are not part of the researcher’s repertoire, additional
training may be required.
Young people invited to collaborate in an investigation must participate fully in
the identification of the research problem, the development of research questions,
choice of design and methods for data collection and dissemination of findings.
Marr and Maloney (2007) describe a range of creative methods that can be utilized
to maximize participation of children and young people in research; they combine
this with a range of participation approaches (Figure 1). A number of such com-
binations were used to good effect in my two studies (eg self initiated film-making;
collaborative story telling etc).
However, I believe that rather more creative strategies, such as drama, painting,
sculpture and photography and peer-to-peer data collection might have been uti-
lized; I also believe that young people in the first study would have welcomed the
chance to self initiate creative approaches to data collection as was made possible
in the second.
Re-visiting past or present pain is clearly challenging for young people. In these
two studies, family violence, mental illness, neglect, drug and alcohol addiction and
suicidality were addressed. Adolescents in the child welfare research were dealing
with their parents’ marital break-up following a twenty year relationship, an inter-
vention order against their father related to long-term family violence, drug and
alcohol issues for several family members, school placement breakdowns for all
three children, suicidality of one sibling and the completed suicide of the close
friend of another (amongst other challenging issues). Trauma was carefully mon-
itored but inevitably stress resulted from the re-visiting; with experience, I have
become increasingly vigilant about post-interview researcher follow-up, in addition
to actively putting support services in place.

Figure 1. Marr P and Maloney K (2007) University of Wollongong What about me?: Engaging
children as co-researchers.
144 Qualitative Social Work 12(2)

The importance of monitoring young participants’ capacity to concentrate and

remain active and responsive is also critical in rights-based research (UNCROC,
1989). Accepting with equanimity a young participant’s right to request ‘time out’,
disengage temporarily and or even withdraw permanently from a study, was espe-
cially challenging for me as an early career researcher; I believe that I may have
sometimes misread these choices as ‘failure’ on my part to engage effectively with
participants.

Maturation and change

Rights-based narrative longitudinal research with children and young people offers
exciting opportunities for the researcher to explore growth and change at the stages
of human development when these processes are occurring most rapidly. It offers a
window into social, emotional and cognitive development that can powerfully
inform early intervention responses that, in turn, have the potential to make
major differences to adult functioning. Children and young people in both of
these studies seemed empowered to take greater command of methods (data col-
lection strategies etc) as the studies evolved and they grew more confident and
mature. This proved especially true over the fifteen years of the mental health
study of course; however, it was also evident in the child and family welfare
study which took place over the relatively shorter period of eighteen months.
Different methods of data collection are clearly required as children grow and
change and are capable of greater participation or collaboration in research.
I find that I must remain sensitized and reflexively responsive to these changes.
In the fifteen year study described, the adolescents became adults and in some
instances, had their own children. At one point I was confronted with the dilemma:
‘Can/should the next generation be invited to enter such a longitudinal study or is
this inappropriately intrusive?’ That question remains unresolved. . .

Culture and language

Participatory collaborative approaches to research create opportunities to include,
empower and advocate for children and young people from culturally and linguis-
tically diverse (CALD) backgrounds whose voices are rarely heard (Jurak, 2003).
Inclusive research of this nature can affirm young people from these backgrounds;
it can sometimes empower them to participate in advocacy endeavours and agitate
for resources to meet their needs. It also extends the researcher in exploration of
more diverse ‘ways of knowing’ or ‘finding out’ (Hartman, 1990). This demands a
high level of cultural competency, frequently acquired through specialized training;
it often involves use of interpreting services. Building trust where CALD issues are
significant again draws upon researcher emotional intelligence (Morrison, 2007) as
s/he often needs to engage with children and young people who are negotiating
challenging socio-emotional terrain ‘between two worlds’. In general CALD young
people and their families are marginalized from both the adolescent mental health
McNamara 145

and welfare systems; this was mirrored in the populations of potential participants
for the two example studies. However, for logistical reasons (concerning access to
interpreters), I also purposively selected young people from English-speaking fam-
ilies. On reflection, whilst some cultural diversity was manifest in each of these
projects, both could have been enriched with proactive inclusion and participation
of families from non-English speaking backgrounds.

Gender and sexuality

Rights-based approaches to research with children and young people have an
important role to play in addressing issues of gender (McNamara, 2009;
McNamara and Neve, 2009; Naples, 2003). Whilst neither empowerment nor par-
ticipation can be guaranteed as a result of inclusion, narrative approaches to data
collection do appear to often achieve these outcomes for girls and young women. In
developmental terms, adolescence generally is not characterized by high levels of
vocal exchange with adults. In both of the studies under consideration here, it was
observed that girls and young women could be effectively silenced in group con-
versations (including within family groups) – especially in the presence of males
(Boorman, Clarke and Nind, 2009; Luepnitz, 1988). Proactive and sensitive facil-
itation by researchers can ensure both inclusion and active participation by chil-
dren and young people of both genders (Hare-Mustin, 1978; Heilman, 1998;
McNamara, 2009).
Ensuring duty of care obligations be met (for example, by offering counselling
access) during and following research around sensitive and confronting issues relat-
ing to gender and sexuality is vital (Australian Research Centre for Sex, Health and
Society, 2010). At various points during my fifteen year mental health study, I
needed to link participants with support services; in two instances, serious depres-
sive episodes related to sexuality issues had occurred just prior to data collection;
mental health of the young participants needed to be carefully monitored.
Maintaining optimum participation by young people in making sense of this
data was critical. This was especially challenging when one matter was subject to
criminal investigation.

Dissemination
Storytelling, especially through the voices of participants, can be powerful in dis-
semination and advocacy. Researchers too, can use storytelling to good effect.
Comparing the longitudinal narratives of young women who are former adolescent
inpatients, to the enormously popular BBC TV series Seven Up (Apted, 2007)
effectively engaged two Shadow Ministers in the Australian Parliament; sharing
these research participants’ experience of inadequate mental health resources over
long periods of time seemingly influenced Australian mental health policy in the
2007 election (McNamara, 2009). Wherever appropriate, however, children and
young people should engage in advocacy by telling their own stories, through
146 Qualitative Social Work 12(2)

writing, through art, through multimedia and, of course, in oral presentations at

seminars, conferences and other gatherings. In some instances, participants in my
studies have wanted to share their stories publicly in support of policy change or in
a bid to improve funding. Inclusion, participation, empowerment and advocacy
must, however, be carefully juxtaposed with ‘duty of care’. I am acutely aware of
the social stigma that unfortunately still prevails around both mental illness and
welfare issues. These young participants had far less professional and life experi-
ence to draw upon in making such choices than myself. I attempted to explain the
implications of exposure carefully and protect rights to privacy as requested or as
was professionally appropriate. In the child and family welfare study, the young
people involved decided that their videotaped conversations about proximal
changes towards the family’s goals of ‘improved family relationships’ can be
viewed at conferences and for training; however, they have chosen to make this
possible outside Australia only, to protect their privacy. One woman in the mental
health study says that she now wishes that her parents had not engaged her in
media activities when she was an adolescent. Her parents asked this of her to
support their advocacy for improved funding of mental health services. She now
feels that her relative naivety about the implications of public exposure regarding
her illness was exploited; this had negative repercussions, both at her place of work
and in her local community.

Research principles
A set of principles for research with children and young people has been distilled
though processing the above themes within the rights-based conceptual framework
suggested – with its cornerstones of inclusion, participation, empowerment and advo-
cacy. The principles suggested here, whilst by no means exhaustive, may assist
longitudinal narrative researchers in developing rights-based projects with children
and young people:

. the researcher’s duty of care to children and young people collaborating in

research includes ensuring that all involved are safe; where the young person
or others in the community are determined to be at risk (socially, emotionally,
sexually or physically) action must be taken to address this; care must be taken
to ensure that all who come into contact with children and young people in the
course of the investigation have been screened for their suitability to work with
children; absolute transparency about the limits to confidentiality in communi-
cation with children and young people and their carers from the outset is also
vital
. notwithstanding the often unhelpful time constraints researchers face in contem-
porary socio-political climates, trust-building must be afforded paramount
importance in establishment of rights-based narrative research with children
and young people; this draws upon the reflective capacity (Schon, 1983),
McNamara 147

emotional intelligence (Morrison, 2007) creativity and interpersonal communi-

cation skills of the researcher
. once inclusion and participation are established, these must be respectfully
maintained; this is especially important in longitudinal research; likewise, the
researcher must collaborate proactively from the outset in determining what is to
be reported about the study and how dissemination will be conducted
. presenting findings largely through the voices of participants themselves is by far
the most compelling form of evidential reporting of rights-based children’s
research; using the researcher’s own voice as expressed in the first person also
engenders immediacy, challenges embedded power imbalances and strengthens
the credibility of the research act (Holliday, 2002); at the very least the
researcher must ‘come back and tell (young people) what happened’ at the
end of a study (Kellett, 2010)
. storytelling has special impact, it seems, with policymakers; sharing research
participants’ experience of living with inadequate resources (often over substan-
tial periods of time) can prove a powerful advocacy strategy; rights-based chil-
dren’s researchers using longitudinal narrative methods need to actively identify
such opportunities, whilst maintaining attention to ‘duty of care’; researchers
must maximize young people’s access to information (for example, about impli-
cations of exposure through various mass media, especially the internet) to
inform their decision-making about what aspects of their stories can/should
be disseminated, by whom and how this should be undertaken
. maintaining vigilance for themes of oppression and marginalization on the basis
of gender, culture and ethnicity is intrinsic to rights-based research with children
and young people; young women participants especially, are likely to be hesitant
in the face of possibly ‘getting it wrong’ (Tannen, 1990); they can often be
overwhelmed by the invitation to challenge aspects of their lived realities
(Luepnitz, 1988); language and cultural differences, including barriers to com-
munication, must also be carefully addressed to representatively access the
voices of CALD research participants; only professionally qualified interpreters
should be employed
. as empathic and collaborative investigation, rights-based narrative research with
children and young people conducted over time often places researched and
researcher in a relationship of some intimacy. Just as therapeutic alliances
have ‘endings’, so do those established and maintained (possibly over long per-
iods) in the context of rights-based research with children and young people; due
care must be taken to ‘anticipate’ and ‘name the end’ of the research relation-
ship; in some cases it is important to ritualize the significance of its ending for all
in a developmentally appropriate manner; sharing a meal or short outing
together or passing on an inexpensive but symbolic gift as a memento might
serve as effective parting rituals with children and young people (Imber Black
and Roberts, 1998)
. narrative longitudinal research with children and young people mines a
multiplicity of sensitive issues for the researcher as it does for the researched;
148 Qualitative Social Work 12(2)

vicarious trauma is an occupational hazard (Gentry, 2002; Salston and Figley,

2003); to avoid undue stress and burnout it is vital that the researcher set in
place for her/himself appropriate debriefing mechanisms and, where necessary,
therapeutic supports; similarly therapeutic follow-up must actively be made
available to the participants.

Conclusions
Critical revisiting of two narrative studies illustrates that young people’s rights can
indeed be optimized in longitudinal research, notwithstanding the challenges that
must be overcome. A rights-based approach can also actualize the viability and
credibility of the narrative genre for exploring children and young people’s issues.
When young people are meaningfully included in such research they participate
with real agency; they are empowered and can engage in advocacy for themselves
and others. The approach gives young people ‘voice’ and describes their growth
and change; it can also link change in young people to shifts occurring in the world
around them. It co-creates opportunities to make a real difference in their lives and
in the lived experience of other young people facing similar challenges. The
research practice principles proposed here will hopefully prove helpful to social
work researchers, and those from other disciplines, keen to undertake inclusive and
empowering narrative studies over varying periods of time with children and young
people.

Notes
1. The first study cited in this article was partially funded by the Anita Morawetz
Scholarship in Family Therapy Research, Faculty of Arts University of
Melbourne. The second study was part of a cross national Project conducted under
the auspices of the International Association for Outcome Based Evaluation and
Research in Family and Children’s Services; the Project received funding support
accessed by the Emilia Zancan Foundation, Padua, Italy. All of this support is gratefully
acknowledged.
2. An earlier version of this article was presented at the Symposium ‘Children as Experts
in their Own Lives’ auspiced by the International Society for Child Indicators
and the Social Justice and Social Change Research Centre (University of Western
Sydney) at the University of Western Sydney, Parramatta, NSW, Australia,
3 November 2009.

Acknowledgement
The author would like to acknowledge the great generosity of children, young people and
families who have journeyed with her in narrative research over the past two decades. Their
commitment to the process of longitudinal enquiry has made both those studies, and this
paper, possible.
McNamara 149

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