From the Founder's Desk

On the Relationship between a Researcher and the Researchee

Research is a journey that is never complete because when researchers interact with researchees, the latter becomes a part of the former and their consciousness affecting their thinking processes, manner of relating and behaviour.

The lives of both the researcher and the researched give birth to research and in the process, the unfamiliar becomes familiar. This means that when we interact with them and their way of life in their socio-cultural context, we start questioning what has been accepted in our own culture and how we accepted things as normal just as they were passed on to us by society. Therefore, the familiar starts to become unfamiliar.

It is the exploration of the researcher's journey that makes way for the journey of exploration of the participant. Merging with the researched is necessary for empathetic understanding but Erikson says that the 'Researcher should have the capacity of disciplined use of subjectivity' which means that there can be times when we as researchers might try to push our own subjective experience on to others.

Rachel Alice

Founder and Director

FAR-Find A Researchee