5 principles to guide your inclusive research practice
How to include people with access needs in your research. You don’t know? Keep reading! Do you know? These principles can help too!
In 2022 the global ResearchOps Community hosted a discussion on accessibility and inclusion. We recorded the conversations and decided they were so rich, we should try to create some training from the experiences and ideas that were shared. There were already so many ideas about ‘co-design’ and ‘best practices’, but what did they look like for ‘boots on the ground’ design researchers?
We trialled some practical workshops partnering with co-facilitators from the ozewai.org community. We learned some super useful things along the way…
- There are actually 5 principles that cover everything we need to work with people with diverse lived experiences. We introduce them in this article.
- The workshops were an opportunity to test, model and refine the inclusive practices themselves.
So far we have delivered the Inclusive Research Workshops to over 100 people, from 7 countries, attending from government, NFP, health and corporate sectors.
About the 5 principles for inclusive research
All five principles are intertwined, each can be used as an entry point, but just covering one principle alone will not progress your team to develop an inclusive practice. There quickly comes a point where all of the five principles are needed to some degree.
There are three principles that we call “values principles” and two principles that we call “practice principles”. The practice principles are the means by which the values principles are supported and actioned.
The values principles are:
- Safety
- Diversity
- Equity
The practice principles are:
- Immersion
- Piloting
Inclusive practice has to be trauma informed
It is very important to prioritise becoming ‘Trauma Informed’. Learning to develop trauma informed practice is the foundation of harm minimization.
All 5 principles are subject to a trauma informed approach. You can find out more about Trauma Informed Design and Research in Applying trauma-informed principles to user-centred design, published by the ResearchOps Community.
About the ‘values principles’
- Safety
Safety is the most complex principle to understand and implement. There are multiple facets to what constitutes “safety”. A trauma-informed approach knows that we can only ever minimise risks, we can never guarantee a 100% safe experience for every person. Recognising that there is a persistent risk of harm, and that practitioners need to be vigilant for signs of harm, is the first step to enabling a safe experience.
4 aspects of safety
- General safety: the overarching themes that underpin all areas of safety.
- Physical safety: for ‘in person’ research activities
- Cognitive safety: to enable participants to comfortably process information and confidently participate in research activities
- Psychosocial safety: understanding the potential psychosocial dynamics of stigma, discrimination and trauma for any research participant or team member
2. Diversity
Diversity means including or involving people from a range of different backgrounds, environments and experiences. There’s a lot of diversity in the experiences of participants, and that includes people with access needs, especially when it comes to how they access technology.
All accessibility guidelines recommend testing with people with access needs. ‘Best practice’ without early project research and testing doesn’t deliver inclusive designs.
This is where the values of Immersion, Safety, and Piloting come into play. It is through the combination of these practices that we understand what diversity looks like, and we understand the common access needs across different lived experiences.
3. Equity
The term “equity” refers to fairness and justice and is distinguished from equality.
Whereas equality means providing the same to all, equity means recognizing that we do not all start from the same place and must acknowledge and make adjustments to imbalances.
The process is ongoing, requiring us to identify and overcome intentional and unintentional barriers arising from bias or systemic structures.
National Association of Colleges and Employers
Equity is tightly interwoven with Safety. Immersion teaches us what equity looks like for people with different lived experiences and different access needs. Diversity means equity can look different to different people, even those with similar lived experiences.
In order to be truly equitable, we must shift our mindset from ‘researcher as the expert’ and ‘participant as a research subject’.
The reality is that inclusive research considers each participant a subject matter expert in their own experience and in their own methods of using technology. The dynamics need to be relational and reciprocal.
If we consider participants to be subject matter experts, then it follows that they will be remunerated for their time and expertise. Equitable practice is resourced with appropriate finances and time.
About the ‘practice principles’
- Immersion
All too often, the missing vital component of research is the contribution of “lived experience”.
Any recommendations we make, or anything we design, must be grounded in an understanding of the lived experiences of the people it will affect. There is no substitute for Immersion when it comes to including people with lived experience in our research practices.
This might seem like a daunting task, but the important thing is to make the first step. The first law of immersion is that we are always learning, we never reach the full extent of that tacit understanding which informs our research and design practice.
Immersion is not something we can do simply with our “professional development” hat on. Immersion is about a personal, human commitment to seek authentic relationships with individuals and organisations. Immersion means we have to be prepared to have our assumptions challenged, and our minds changed.
Social media is a fantastic entry into learning about the experiences of people. You can follow advocacy organisations, community groups, and individuals who talk about their lived experience. You can start right now, simply by following these hashtags in your preferred social media platform:
#Accessibility #A11y #AssistiveTechnology #DisabilityRights #DisabilityInclusion #Deaf #HardOfHearing #VisionImpaired #Blind #LivedExperience
2. Piloting
Piloting and Safety are inseparable. There is no way to implement safe practices without piloting what we intend to do. Immersion teaches us how and what we pilot, across the whole research process — for every participant.
This is a significant adjustment to current research practices, it’s important to allocate time and resources to support a continuous piloting practice.
Learning resources
- Visit the OZeWAI website for helpful links and learning resources.
- Subscribe to the Inclusive Research Workshop mailing list to keep up to date with news and upcoming public workshops.
- Follow the Inclusive Research Workshops LinkedIn showcase page, or
- Email inclusive.research@ozewai.org for more details about customised workshops for your teams.
Authors and acknowledgements
Irith Williams works as a freelance strategic designer and inclusion and accessibility advisor. With over 10 years experience working in sensitive settings for design she seeks to partner with people with lived experience to make useful stuff.
Brigitta (Bri) Norton is a Digital Strategist and Accessibility Specialist based in Canberra, Australia and has been an Accessibility Lead for both State and Federal Government. Bri is the co-chair of Australia’s Web Accessibility Initiative OZeWAI.org, a Standards Australia Accessible ICT Procurement Committee Member and a member of the ResearchOps.Community Cheese Board.
Thank you to our co-facilitators, collaborators, and attendees: Scott Grimley, Adam Cooper, Andrew Downie, Scott Nixon and workshop participants. This work is the culmination of two years of collaboration and refinement through workshop delivery and reflection.
