What the “Co-Stitch” initiative shows us about research impact.

By Kate Bowen- Viner, PhD Candidate and Brigstow Co-Stitch Researcher

According to the UKRI, research impact is the effect that knowledge generated in research has beyond academia. As such, and as Śliwa and Kellard (2022) point out, in academia it is often assumed that research impact is quantifiably measurable and happens after a researcher has generated findings. For example, the number of times research findings have been cited in government policies is sometimes used as evidence of research impact that fulfils the requirements of the UK’s Research Excellence Framework (REF). Measuring/evidencing the effects of research in such ways might seem sensible for holding academics and higher education institutions (HEIs) to account regarding the way they use research funding. However, as Taylor et al (2020) argue, such approaches can lead academics and HEIs to focus on achieving a narrow range of measurable research impacts (e.g. journal publications/numbers of journal citations) and overlook other things that research projects do.

In this blog, I introduce the Brigstow Institute’s Co-Stitch Initiative and explain how it highlights problems with common notions of academic research impact. I then draw on the Co-Stitch Initiative to argue that broadening what counts as research impact in academia presents affordances.

What is the Co-Stitch Initiative?

Brigstow’s Co-Stitch Initiative is a research project that is interested in what hand stitching does in communities. In other words, the Co-Stitch Initiative focuses on what happens when people come together to hand sew.

The Initiative takes a collaborative approach. It involves artists/crafters and staff at the Brigstow Institute working with local communities to develop hand stitching workshops. Everyone who attends such workshops receives a Co-Stitch bag full of materials (e.g. fabric, threads, scissors) to use as they want to. I am involved in the project as a research assistant and have been hand stitching with participants, as well as talking with them.

Whilst my role has not (yet) involved writing up or publishing research findings, the Co-Stitch research project has already made a difference in the world. To put it another way, the research project has been impactful in ways that are not captured in common definitions and audits of research impact in academia. For example, the Co-Stitch research project and everything it involves (e.g. participants, workshops, fabric, thread) has contributed to different people connecting with one another. The excerpt below from my journal focuses on a moment where fabric and embroidery hoops in a Co-Stitch workshop helped two women participants to form a friendship:

“As she was embroidering her Co-Stitch bag with fern stitch, U started talking with S who was sitting on the opposite side of the table. Like U, S was holding fabric that was stretched out in a wooden embroidery hoop. She was working on embroidering flowers and was using red thread. U asked S a question about the embroidery S was working on. S held up the fabric stretched out in the embroidery hoop so that U could see it and smiled as she did so. U commented on how nice S’s work was. The women then continued to speak to one another throughout the session, all whilst stitching. Sometimes they would look up at each other whilst they spoke, other times they would look down at their stitching work whilst speaking. At the end of the workshop, the pair swapped telephone numbers. S also invited U to a WhatsApp group for people living in the area where the Co-Stitch workshop is held. As such, it felt like the Co-Stitch workshop, including the stitching practices and the materials involved had contributed to U and S forming a friendship and becoming part of each other’s communities.”

Making a difference without researcher findings

As such an example demonstrates, the Co-Stitch Initiative is making a difference in participants’ lives that is not dependent on a researcher publishing results or findings. As such, the Initiative raises questions about whether common understandings of research impact are too narrow in focus. This is because the idea that research impact involves research findings influencing the world, overlooks the difference that other elements of a research project (e.g. objects, participants, methods) make in the world.

As Taylor et al (2020) suggest, there are affordances to broadening the scope of what counts as academic research impact:

1. Broadening what counts as research impact can help researchers to consider what difference every element of a research project makes in the world. Such considerations influenced the way that the Co-Stitch team created bags of sewing materials for participants. The Co-Stitch team did not give all participants the same bags and materials. Rather, we considered what participants had said about the items they would find useful and how the bags could make a difference in their lives (e.g. make them feel valued, make it easier for them to stitch at home). As such, the bags themselves are part of the research project’s impact, or the way it is making a difference in participants’ lives.
2. Defining research impact as something that is not dependent on researchers publishing findings could help HEIs to acknowledge that research projects can have legacies that do not involve researchers or their ideas/plans. For example, in the Co-Stitch Initiative, some participants have been discussing continuing to stitch together, even after the Co-Stitch workshops end. Whilst the artist/facilitator has been supportive of such plans, they will not be involved in creating or facilitating a future stitching group. Acknowledging such researcher-free legacies might help to disrupt the way that common understandings of research impact (e.g. those defined by the UK’s REF) often lead HEIs to value specific measurable research outputs that can be directly attributable to an academic or research team.

Challenges

Broadening the scope of what counts as research impact also presents challenges. If research impact involves every element of a research project helping make a difference in the world, it is difficult to accurately quantify it.

Even so, being unable to accurately quantify research impact can be framed as an opportunity. As Taylor et al 2020 suggest, if research impact is not limited to specific measurable outputs, then research can make a difference in the world in creative, unexpected, and immeasurable ways.