Methods for Influencing Social Policy: The Role of Social Experiments

Abstract

Research methods in community psychology have grown more diverse since the Swampscott conference, but rigorous social experiments maintain a place among the multiplicity of methods that can promote community psychology values. They are particularly influential in policy circles. Two examples of social experiments to end homelessness for different populations illustrate their role. Both studies show that offering extremely poor and disenfranchised people autonomy and the resources they seek works better than "helping" them to overcome deficits in ways designed by well-meaning service providers. Experiments are neither the first nor the last method community psychologists should employ, but are a critical part of the field's armamentarium for systems change.

Engaging the Struggle for Decolonial Approaches to Teaching Community Psychology

“…With an understanding that community psychology has historically valued social experimentation, and recognizing the ongoing role of well‐crafted empirical designs in policy influence (Shinn, ), we have chosen to focus on the development of qualitatively nuanced and multi‐dimensional research methods, in collaboration with community members. Research in depth psychology has traditionally followed phenomenological approaches that are heavily researcher centered, and encourage ongoing self‐reflection on the researcher's subjectivity throughout an inquiry.…”

Reflections on the Future of Community Psychology from the Generations after Swampscott: A Commentary and Introduction to the Special Issue

“…Shinn (), whose graduate training in community psychology took place in the mid‐1970s, makes a forceful argument “that rigorous social experiments have a place among the multiplicity of methods that can promote community psychology values in the next half century.” Shinn is a critic of the acontextualized research that is common in translational science and evidenced‐based practice research, but believes that experiments that take into account local contexts are particularly useful for informing policy. She briefly describes two experiments seeking to end homelessness that illustrate how community psychology principles and values can be infused in rigorous social experiments.…”