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Supporting Scotland's vibrant voluntary sector

Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations

The Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations is the membership organisation for Scotland's charities, voluntary organisations and social enterprises. Charity registered in Scotland SC003558. Registered office Mansfield Traquair Centre, 15 Mansfield Place, Edinburgh EH3 6BB.

Evidence library

Good Evidence: A guide to help community organisations produce research that gets taken seriously

This research guide aims to help community-based researchers leverage their strengths for producing important and useful research findings by providing them with a framework to build trustworthiness into their research.

The guide aims to support people in community organisations to undertake research that can enjoy more credibility with its intended audiences. It seeks to counteract the perception that research undertaken by community organsations and self-trained researchers isn’t credible because they simply want to prove a case they want to make on behalf of themselves or their community, rather than being objective inquirers. It is specifically aimed at those who find themselves in a position to conduct research without being research specialists.

The guide:

  • Introduces three basic principles – trustworthiness, ethics and bias – that all researchers should think about throughout the research process
  • Shows how these principles can be embedded in each stage of the research process – from research design and planning to data collection to dissemination.
  • Provides short summary narratives for each topic, with tips for further reading.
  • Signposts readers to freely available resources to deepen their understanding of each topic as appropriate.
Last modified on 22 February 2022