Co-operative Inquiry

= A form of Participatory Inquiry, reflecting the Participatory Turn in Research

Definition

John Heron:

"Co-operative inquiry involves two or more people researching a topic through their own experience of it, using a series of cycles in which they move between this experience and reflecting together on it. Each person is co-subject in the experience phases and co-researcher in the reflection phases." (http://participatorystudies.com/2011/03/29/co-operative-inquiry-outlined/)

Characteristics

John Heron:

"The defining features of co-operative inquiry are:

• All the subjects are as fully involved as possible as co-researchers in all research decisions – about both content and method – taken in the reflection phases.

• There is intentional interplay between reflection and making sense on the one hand, and experience and action on the other.

• There is explicit attention through appropriate procedures to the validity of the inquiry and its findings.

• There is a radical epistemology for a wide-ranging inquiry method that can be both informative about and transformative of any aspect of the human condition. It involves a congruence of four forms of knowing: propositional, practical, presentational, and experiential:

o Propositional knowing, or knowing that, is expressed in statements. o Practical knowing, or knowing how, is expressed in the exercise of a skill. o Presentational knowing, or intuitive knowing of significant pattern, is expressed in graphic, plastic, moving, musical and verbal art-forms. o Experiential knowing, or knowing by acquaintace, is manifest as imaging and feeling the presence of some energy, entity, person, place, process or thing.

• There are, as well as validity procedures, a range of special skills suited to such all-purpose experiential inquiry.

• The full range of human sensibilities – a transparent body-mind with an open and unbound awareness – is available as an instrument of inquiry."

(http://participatorystudies.com/2011/03/29/co-operative-inquiry-outlined/)

Stages

David Hiles:

"Co-operative inquiry is Heron’s basic research tool for a participatory inquiry paradigm. “In co-operative inquiry the exclusive roles [. . of researcher and subject] are replaced by a co-operative relationship of bilateral initiative and control, so that all those involved work together as co-researchers and as co-subjects”. . “This is not research on people, but research with people” (Heron, 1998, p. 234).

“Co-operative inquiry . . involves two or more people researching a topic through their experience of it, using a series of cycles in which they move between this experience and reflecting together on it” (Heron, 1998, p. 235).

This participatory approach to research, adapts the action research model, involving repeated cycling through four steps:

• Step 1: Agreeing, planning and devising a focus of inquiry
• Step 2: Action phase – observing and recording experiences
• Step 3: Reflection – immersion engagement with experience
• Step 4: Evaluation – sharing, reframing, validating, for the next cycle."

- Participatory Perspectives on Counselling Research. By DAVID HILES: Summary of paper presented at NCCR Conference, Newport, November 22, 2008.

John Heron:

"An outline of inquiry stages

Stage 1 The first reflection phase for the inquirers to choose:

   * The focus or topic of the inquiry and the type of inquiry.
   * A launching statement of the inquiry topic.
   * A plan of action for the first action phase to explore some aspect of the inquiry topic.
   * A method of recording experiences during the first action phase.

Stage 2 The first action phase when the inquirers are:

   * Exploring in experience and action some aspect of the inquiry topic.
   * Applying an integrated range of inquiry skills.
   * Keeping records of the experiential data generated.

Stage 3 Full immersion in the action phase with great openness to experience; the inquirers may:

   * Break through into new awareness.
   * Lose their way.
   * Transcend the inquiry format.

Stage 4 The second reflection phase; the inquirers share data from the action phase and:

   * Review and modify the inquiry topic in the light of making sense of data about the explored aspect of it.
   * Choose a plan for the second action phase to explore the same or a different aspect of the inquiry topic.
   * Review the method of recording data used in the first action phase and amend it for use in the second.

Subsequent stages will:

   * Involve, including the first, from five to eight full cycles of reflection and action, with varying patterns of divergence and convergence, in the action phases, over aspects of the inquiry topic.
   * Include a variety of intentional procedures, in the reflection phases, and of special skills in the action phases, for enhancing the validity of the process.
   * End with a major reflection phase for pulling the threads together, clarifying outcomes, and deciding whether to write a co-operative report.
   * Be followed by post-group collaboration on writing up any agreed form of report."

(http://participatorystudies.com/2011/03/29/co-operative-inquiry-outlined/)