Engaging the National Youth Football Community in a Child Sexual Abuse Research Advisory Board

While research advisory boards are common in community-based research, there are challenges with forming a board on sensitive topics and among communities who are less often engaged in research such as youth football organizations.

We share our processes for forming a national board, challenges associated with engaging some football community members, and feedback from our board members.

Board members were recruited with a multidisciplinary team of youth football organization employees. Researchers compared demographic characteristics of interested individuals who joined the board to those who did not.

Board members were different in several ways to those who did not participate. Additionally, board members experienced minimal harm from participating in discussions on sensitive topics.

Although several interested individuals joined the board, more than one-half of the interested individuals did not. It is important for researchers to make intentional efforts to engage underrepresented individuals and ensure the research is beneficial to all community members.