Toolkit for Remote Inclusive Research

This strategy can be used for: Dissemination

Research team members work together to develop a plain-language article and submit the article to an academic journal/publication. This article may or may not follow the typical structure of an academic research article. The article is written in language understandable to people with disabilities and other community members less familiar with research. The resource list below features articles published in journals that support the publication of plain language articles.

Team members with disabilities may participate in writing, or they may work with the academically-trained researchers to:

Decide what should be in the article
Provide feedback on written article
Develop visuals to support written information
Dictate content they want in the article

The team can use other decision-making strategies as they develop the article.

Team members with disabilities who contribute to the article should be authors. The team may decide to list each person’s first and last name. Teams may also use the team name as the author, and include the names of individual team members in the acknowledgements section. Team members identified by name must give permission to disclose their affiliation with the research team.

Accommodations for Remote Collaboration

Several video conference platforms have an automatic transcription feature that can be used to record a team members’ spoken contributions and edited into the manuscript.
During a video conference meeting, make edits to an article outline or article text line by line as all team members view the document using the share screen function.
Email team members drafts of the article outline or text, and ask them to edit or provide feedback on specific content.
Use collaborative documents (e.g., google forms) to allow each team member to make edits to the article.

Access Accommodations and Support

Team members select images to represent the topics/content they would like to include in the article.
Team members dictate or audio record the ideas of what information to share in the article; other team members then transcribe and edit the original text.
Audio record someone reading the text of the article, so team members can listen and provide feedback.
Break up the steps of developing content and writing the article into multiple meetings, to reduce attention demands and prevent fatigue.
Color code and highlight key information that team members need to review/edit.

Resources

The British Journal of Learning Disabilities published this Information Guide for Writers
The following articles are examples of plain language academic articles:
Haigh, A., Lee, D., Shaw, C., Hawthorne, M., Chamberlain, S., Newman, D. W., Clarke, Z., & Beail, N. (2013). What things make people with a learning disability happy and satisfied with their lives: An inclusive research project. Journal of Applied Research in Intellectual Disabilities, 26(1), 26–33. https://doi.org/10.1111/jar.12012

Stanley, Z., Lauretani, P., Conforti, D., Cowen, J., DuBois, D., & Renwick, R. (2019). Working to make research inclusive: Perspectives on being members of the Voices of Youths Project. Disability & Society, 34(9–10), 1660–1667. https://doi.org/10.1080/09687599.2019.1619232

Townson, L., Macauley, S., Harkness, E., Chapman, R., Docherty, A., Dias, J., Eardley, M., & McNulty, N. (2004). We are all in the same boat: Doing ‘people-led research.’ British Journal of Learning Disabilities, 32(2), 72–76. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-3156.2004.00282.x

White, E. L., & Morgan, M. F. (2012). Yes! I am a researcher. The research story of a young adult with Down syndrome. British Journal of Learning Disabilities, 40(2), 101–108. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-2779-6_129-1

Williams, V., Simons, K., & Swindon People First Research Team. (2005). More researching together: The role of nondisabled researchers in working with People First members. British Journal of Learning Disabilities, 33(1), 6–14. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-3156.2004.00299.x

Tools to Explore

Google Docs can be used by teams to collaboratively write and edit.
Otter.ai uses artificial intelligence to automatically transcribe speech. You may need to edit the transcript, but it will capture most speech. You can transcribe a limited number of files for free.

References

Examples of studies using this strategy

Dowse, L. (2009). ‘Some people are never going to be able to do that’. Challenges for people with intellectual disability in the 21st century. Disability & Society, 24(5), 571–584. https://doi.org/10.1080/09687590903010933

Haigh, A., Lee, D., Shaw, C., Hawthorne, M., Chamberlain, S., Newman, D. W., Clarke, Z., & Beail, N. (2013). What things make people with a learning disability happy and satisfied with their lives: An inclusive research project. Journal of Applied Research in Intellectual Disabilities, 26(1), 26–33. https://doi.org/10.1111/jar.12012

Rodgers, J. (1999). Trying to get it right: Undertaking research involving people with learning difficulties. Disability & Society, 14(4), 421–433. https://doi.org/10.1080/09687599926046

Stanley, Z., Lauretani, P., Conforti, D., Cowen, J., DuBois, D., & Renwick, R. (2019). Working to make research inclusive: Perspectives on being members of the Voices of Youths Project. Disability & Society, 34(9–10), 1660–1667. https://doi.org/10.1080/09687599.2019.1619232

Strnadová, I., & Walmsley, J. (2018). Peer‐reviewed articles on inclusive research: Do co‐researchers with intellectual disabilities have a voice?. Journal of Applied Research in Intellectual Disabilities, 31(1), 132-141.https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28643371/

Townson, L., Macauley, S., Harkness, E., Chapman, R., Docherty, A., Dias, J., Eardley, M., & McNulty, N. (2004). We are all in the same boat: Doing ‘people-led research.’ British Journal of Learning Disabilities, 32(2), 72–76. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-3156.2004.00282.x

Walmsley, J. (2004). Involving users with learning difficulties in health improvement: Lessons from inclusive learning disability research. Nursing Inquiry, 11(1), 54–64. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1440-1800.2004.00197.x

White, E. L., & Morgan, M. F. (2012). Yes! I am a researcher. The research story of a young adult with Down syndrome. British Journal of Learning Disabilities, 40(2), 101–108. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-2779-6_129-1

Williams, V., Simons, K., & Swindon People First Research Team. (2005). More researching together: The role of nondisabled researchers in working with People First members. British Journal of Learning Disabilities, 33(1), 6–14. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-3156.2004.00299.x

Examples of studies using this accommodation

Bigby, C., & Frawley, P. (2010). Reflections on doing inclusive research in the "Making life good in the community" study. Journal of Intellectual and Developmental Disability, 35(2), 53–61. https://doi.org/10.3109/13668251003716425

Di Lorito, C., Bosco, A., Birt, L., & Hassiotis, A. (2018). Co-research with adults with intellectual disability: A systematic review. Journal of Applied Research in Intellectual Disabilities, 31(5), 669–686. https://doi.org/10.1111/jar.12435

Kramer, J., Barth, Y., Curtis, K., Livingston, K., O’Neil, M., Smith, Z., Vallier, S., & Wolfe, A. (2013). Involving youth with disabilities in the development and evaluation of a new advocacy training: Project TEAM. Disability and Rehabilitation, 35(7), 614–622. https://doi.org/10.3109/09638288.2012.705218

Kramer, J. M., Garcia-Iriarte, E., Kramer, J. C., & Hammel, J. (2011). Following through to the end: The use of inclusive strategies to analyze and interpret data in participatory action research with individuals with learning disabilities. Journal of Applied Research in Intellectual Disabilities, 24(3), 263–273. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-3148.2010.00602.x

Kramer, J. M., & Schwartz, A. E. (2018). Development of the Pediatric Disability Inventory-Patient Reported Outcome (PEDI-PRO) measurement conceptual framework and item candidates. Scandinavian Journal of Occupational Therapy, 25(5), 335–346. https://doi.org/10.1080/11038128.2018.1502344

Martin, L., Grandia, P., Ouellette-Kuntz, H., & Cobigo, V. (2016). From framework to practice: Person-directed planning in the real world. Journal of Applied Research in Intellectual Disabilities : JARID, 29(6), 552–565. https://doi.org/10.1111/jar.12214

Read, S., Nte, S., Corcoran, P., & Stephens, R. (2013). Using action research to design bereavement software: Engaging people with intellectual disabilities for effective development. Journal of Applied Research in Intellectual Disabilities : JARID, 26(3), 195–206. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-3148.2012.00686.x

Salmon, N., Carey, E., & Hunt, A. (2014). Research skills for people with intellectual disabilities. Learning Disability Practice, 17(3). https://doi.org/10.7748/ldp2014.03.17.3.27.e1512

Stevenson, M. (2014). Participatory data analysis alongside co-researchers who have down syndrome. Journal of Applied Research in Intellectual Disabilities, 27(1), 23–33. https://doi.org/10.1111/jar.12080

Strnadová, I., Cumming, T. M., Knox, M., & Parmenter, T. (2014). Building an inclusive research team: The importance of team building and skills training. Journal of Applied Research in Intellectual Disabilities : JARID, 27(1), 13–22. https://doi.org/10.1111/jar.12076

Strnadová, I., Walmsley, J., Johnson, K., & Cumming, T. M. (2016). Diverse faces of inclusive research: Reflecting on three research studies. Scandinavian Journal of Disability Research, 18(1), 52–64. https://doi.org/10.1080/15017419.2014.964766

Strnadová, I., & Walmsley, J. (2018). Peer‐reviewed articles on inclusive research: Do co‐researchers with intellectual disabilities have a voice? Journal of Applied Research in Intellectual Disabilities, 31(1), 132-141. https://doi.org/10.1111/jar.12378

Williamson, H. J., van Heumen, L., & Schwartz, A. E. (2020). Photovoice with individuals with intellectual and/or developmental disabilities: Lessons learned from inclusive research efforts. Collaborations: A Journal of Community-Based Research and Practice, 3(1), 8. https://doi.org/10.33596/coll.45

Plain Language Academic Article