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The premise of this chapter is that methodological ‘tribes’ in higher education create ‘territories’ of research practice that do little to encourage those new to research to reconceptualise methodology. This premise is based upon the perceived absence of dialogic space, beyond an expert academic community, that would allow open critique of the degree to which research methodologies make sense for those ‘on the ground’. As such, it is argued that practices of this nature signify methodological process over genuine debate around methodological theory, which can serve to encourage methodological idolatry. Phenomenography has been selected, and analysed, in this chapter as an example of a research methodology used in higher education, in order to reveal both the encoded messages of phenomenography and the layering of meaning that such messages convey. The chapter concludes by arguing for a repositioning of research methodologies as ontologically coherent heuristic devices that enable us to generate and test theory, rather than as processes of discovery that may lead us to unsubstantiated claims of knowledge generation.

This chapter presents an analysis of the lived experiences of academic mobility for three educational researchers, at various stages of their research career, from different European national contexts. Lived experiences were explored by examining the metaphors used by each educational researcher to convey their experiences of academic mobility. These metaphors were then explored in further depth via individual interviews. The purpose of this analysis is to extend the debate around academic mobility, which often fails to differentiate between academic mobility and mobile academics. In addition, this chapter explores the impact of the desire for, and experience of, academic mobility on the complex, hybrid and changing process of academic identity formation. In conclusion, the chapter questions whether conventional ideas of research in the social sciences and humanities are essentially connected in one way or another to the nation state, or whether research is fundamentally an international occupation.

The purpose of this paper is to describe a youth work model of participatory research practice which utilises a range of methods within non-traditional research settings, highlighting the importance of trust, risk-taking and the creation of mutually respectful and non-hierarchical relationships. The paper suggests that such methods enable the development of new insights into previously intractable challenges when working with adolescents needing a safeguarding response from professionals.

The paper reflects on the challenges and successes of a project which brought police officers and young people together to develop solutions to improving safeguarding responses to young people affected by sexual violence and related forms of harm in adolescence. In particular, this paper focuses on a residential held in October 2016 in the Lake District involving 7 officers and 15 young people.

Despite a number of ethical challenges throughout the project, this paper makes the case that potentially high-risk participatory research projects can be supported and managed by university research centres. However, for these to be successful, staff need to work in trauma-informed ways, and possess high-level expertise in group work facilitation. Transparency, honesty, constancy and a range of different and creative activities, including mental and physical challenges, all contributed to the success of the project.

By detailing the empirical steps taken to develop, support and realise this project, this paper advances a youth work model of participatory research practice, filling an important gap within the methodological literature on participatory work with young people affected by sexual violence.

Through discussion of research about the leadership of two schools, this paper explores the complexity of school leadership and how various contextual elements interact with the work of principals in schools that are attempting to create inclusive, rich, worthwhile and unique schools. A systems thinking leadership and context model is developed to frame the exploration of the two cases, which, in turn, helps inform the veracity and development of the model.

The research reported is broadly based on multiple-perspective case studies that have included individual and/or group interviews with school leaders, teachers, students, parents and/or school council members, observation and document analysis. The focus for this paper is on evidence from the cases that elucidate the model.

A leadership and context view of schools helps to understand how school leaders work with, within and influence various contextual factors to develop schools that are both successful and unique. The cases demonstrated how individual leadership factors including career histories, personalities and values coalesced with school and broader community factors in reciprocal ways that resulted in school-specific improvements.

The research is limited by the nature of bounded, small number, qualitative case research. Nevertheless, the authors suggest that the school leadership and context systems model the authors presented captures much of the complexity of the successful leadership of these schools. The authors further suggest that this model provides a conceptual contribution to the study of successful school leadership that moves beyond more linear leadership views. Implications of this research and the conceptual contributions that the authors advance are that leadership and context should be considered in reciprocal and nuanced ways across a complex variety of contextual levels.

These cases explore the growth and development of new school communities and capture the dynamic interactions between leadership and context within the complex arrangements of policy, system, history and community. The cases demonstrated how individual leadership factors, including career histories, personalities and values, coalesced with school and broader community factors in reciprocal ways that resulted in school-specific improvements. These findings and the system thinking leadership model help school leaders to consider their own work in developing successful and unique schools.

School leadership is important for school success, and schools that meet student and community needs are important for society. The authors’ system thinking leadership model helps school leaders improve their practice in creating more interesting and successful schools that meet student and community needs.

At a time when international sharing of information and international testing of schools is pushing towards a uniformity of thinking about what good schools should be, the reality of leading schools is far different. This paper contributes to the knowledge about how school leaders navigate contextual complexities to create successful and unique schools that meet local needs.

Negative attitudes towards “personality disorder” are common among mental health professionals. This study aims to design a psychoeducational training targeting attitudes to “personality disorder” for staff working in a London psychiatric hospital. Its impact on staff attitudes was evaluated.

Mental health clinicians were recruited from five acute psychiatric wards. Feasibility of implementing the training was measured. A free-association exercise explored baseline attitudes to “personality disorder” and visual analogue scales assessed staff attitudes pre- and post-training. Content analysis of staff feedback was carried out.

Psychoeducational training was found to be feasible, well-attended and highly valued by ward staff (N = 47). Baseline results revealed negative perceptions of “personality disorder”. Post-training, significant improvements in understanding, levels of compassion and attitudes to working with service users with a diagnosis of a “personality disorder” were observed. Staff feedback highlighted desire for further training and support.

The sample size was relatively small and there was no control group, so findings should be interpreted with caution.

The findings highlight the need for support for staff working with service users with diagnoses of “personality disorder” on acute psychiatric wards. Providing regular training with interactive components may promote training as a resource for staff well-being. Planning to ensure service users’ and carers’ views are incorporated into the design of future training will be important.

This study is innovative in that it investigates the impact of a brief psychoeducational training on “personality disorder” designed for mental health staff on acute psychiatric wards.

This study aims to generate theory that represented charity peer leader experiences, facilitating well-being interventions to two specific groups of people: new mothers and refugees.

Part 1 of this study used in-depth interviews (n = 8) and phone calls with experienced mothers (called “peer leaders”) who had facilitated well-being interventions to new mothers. These interviews were analysed using Constructivist Grounded Theory (CGT) (Charmaz, 2014) generating a theory. Following a systematic literature review using the theory categories as search terms, a training approach was devised: The Modelled Training Approach (MTA). Refugees (n = 16) were trained to facilitate another well-being intervention using the MTA followed by a further set of interviews (n = 6). These interviews were analysed using CGT.

A theory was generated representing the “journey” the peer leaders took: their lived experience triggered empathic feelings towards their peers, which motivated them to build a rapport where they gave hope. As a result, the peer leaders felt rewarded.

The literature search did not find any studies looking at the experiences of peer leaders in the above settings. The theory generated could support mental health peer work offsetting statutory health costs.