Consumer and community involvement in health research in Australia: evaluation of researcher training workshops

To evaluate the effectiveness of training workshops aiming to improve researchers' consumer and community involvement (CCI)-related awareness, attitudes and behaviours, and capture remaining barriers to CCI.

Cross-sectional questionnaires.

Participants consisted of University of Queensland researchers attending a CCI training workshop facilitated by The Kids Institute between 2017 and 2023. Participants were invited to complete two surveys with multiple-choice and open-field items: (i) short-term evaluation immediately following workshop attendance to capture reactions, and (ii) long-term evaluation up to 6 years following attendance, including retrospective and current perceptions of confidence, motivation, capability, opportunity and reported behaviours. Survey items mapped to the Kirkpatrick model for training evaluation (reaction, learning, behaviour and results) and the capability, opportunity and motivation model of behaviour change (COM-B). Multiple-choice responses were summarised with descriptive statistics and Chi-squared analysis, whereas open-field responses were mined qualitatively with content analysis.

A total of 17 out of 183 and 104 out of 240 individuals completed/partially completed Surveys 1 and 2, respectively. Survey 1 comments captured satisfaction with content and facilitation, and improved learning (Kirkpatrick's 'reaction' and 'learning'). Most Survey 2 participants were satisfied/highly satisfied with the workshop (n = 82/101, 81%), and agreed that CCI was relevant (n = 88/90, 98%) or valuable (n = 86/89, 97%) to their research (COM-B 'motivation'). When completing Survey 2, a minority (n = 17/90, 19%) felt they were confident/very confident in implementing CCI before the workshop, which increased significantly post-workshop (n = 54/89, 61%; P < 0.05). Participants reported moderate to high levels of capability (n = 78/83, 94%) and capacity (n = 73/83, 88%) implementing CCI. The proportion of researchers implementing CCI in their research increased from 65% (n = 59/91) to 78% (n = 71/91) in the months/years post-workshop (P < 0.05). Researchers reported consistent CCI throughout the research journey and diverse models of involvement. Participants identified financial and administrative institutional barriers to optimal CCI implementation in research. These results align with all elements of the Kirkpatrick and COM-B models.

CCI training improved researchers' CCI-related awareness, confidence and behaviours. However, the remaining barriers to optimal CCI implementation included logistical and institutional barriers, reflecting the opportunity element of COM-B. Thus, although CCI training of researchers is valuable and effective, institutions need to capitalise on these benefits with administrative and financial support.