How does reflexivity develop research projects and researchers?

This session is focussed on a collaborative project which involves a large international team, including Lisa Callagher and Stefan Korber, working to understand and develop reflexive practice in research processes. There have been significant recent trends towards deeper engagement with reflexivity in qualitative, interpretive research. Reflexivity is the process by which people adapt and are shaped in response to experience, and in research processes we consider our reflexivity in order to ‘get a handle’ on how our patterns of being shaped, over time, have an influence on our research projects. We consider how the involvement of the ‘whole person’ in the conduct of research leads to a need to consider reflexivity and reflexive practice on embodied, emotional, thoughtful and relational levels. We seek to integrate and develop, based on the application of reflexivity in a range of research projects, insights about how reflexive practice has particular benefits for the conduct of research projects but also leads to outcomes for researchers’ self-knowledge and future practice.