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Understanding how institutions may support the development of transdisciplinary approaches to sustainability research

Boyle, E.; McGookin, C.; O'Mahony, C.; Bolger, P.; Byrne, E.; Gallachóir, B.Ó.; Mullally, G.; (2023) Understanding how institutions may support the development of transdisciplinary approaches to sustainability research. Research for All , 7 (1) , Article 7. 10.14324/RFA.07.1.07. Green open access

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Abstract

This article analyses the approaches of academics seeking to engage with private, public and community-based stakeholders through transdisciplinary research about pressing sustainability challenges and, in particular, climate change; it outlines aspects of the institutional factors which influence transdisciplinary research. A qualitative approach was employed in conducting 10 semi-structured interviews to analyse the challenges and motivations of academic researchers when working with a range of other stakeholders through transdisciplinary practice. Two key contributions are made through this work. First, this article adds to the existing literature on motivations and challenges for undertaking research with private, public and community stakeholders in a cross-disciplinary manner. Second, the current institutional circumstances influencing such research practices are outlined, alongside potential ways forward. The research presented here has been undertaken in light of the experiences of the two lead co-authors as early career researchers coming from the disciplines of sociology and energy engineering, engaging in transdisciplinary research within a local community context in relation to a regional energy transition project.

Type: Article
Title: Understanding how institutions may support the development of transdisciplinary approaches to sustainability research
Open access status: An open access version is available from UCL Discovery
DOI: 10.14324/RFA.07.1.07
Publisher version: https://doi.org/10.14324/RFA.07.1.07
Language: English
Additional information: © 2023, Evan Boyle, Connor McGookin, Cathal O’Mahony, Paul Bolger, Edmond Byrne, Brian Ó Gallachóir and Gerard Mullally. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Licence (CC BY) 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/, which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Keywords: transdisciplinary research, academic institutions, engaged research, collaboration, co-production, reflective practice, researcher training and development
URI: https://discovery-pp.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10175262
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