Reflecting on my research position & interpretations in the field

As a social constructivist practice theorist, it is impossible to agree with the positivist notion that a researcher can be objective throughout the research process and remain independent of the reality being studied. Instead, as I went into the field, I took some notion of, and continually related my interpretations to, the concepts and ideas that I had critiqued as part of the academic literature review process. Rather than deliberately looking out for these ideas and the data collection process being confirmatory in nature however, I remained open to new observations and thoughts that came to light through conversations, processes, and events that I experienced (see Section 3.3.3).

In accordance with my world-view, all humans are ‘observers, participants, and agents who actively generate and transform the patterns through which they construct the realities that fit them’ (Reich, 2009: 40). As the researcher, these interpretive and transformative processes also applied to me, because how I designed, undertook and analysed the research invariably shaped how reality was constructed at Trinity Close.

Given this, it was essential that I was reflexive about how my own position affected the construction and representation of everyday life. England describes reflexivity as: ‘…

self-critical sympathetic introspection and the self-conscious analytical scrutiny of the self as researcher’ (1994: 244). She argues that being reflexive can lead to new insights and hypotheses about the research questions, and allows the researcher to remain open to any challenges that their theoretical stance almost inevitably raises.

Throughout the fieldwork period I found myself constantly negotiating my role at the Trinity Close site, whether interviewing household or professional practitioners, or attending stakeholder meetings. Indeed, my positionality was multiple and flexible - I was understood differently by different actors, and it changed over time (Horwood

the householders understood participation in the interview process as an obligation that they had to fulfil as a requirement of their tenancy. As such, several interviewees were initially reluctant to share information about their experiences of everyday life at Trinity Close, and the challenges that they encountered, for fear of their accounts jeopardising their tenancy agreement. At first, several householders gave glowing reports of the events following handover, which later in the interview process proved to be doctored accounts providing me with information that the householders thought I wanted to hear, and that portrayed them positively (i.e. self-reporting action bias) (Foddy, 1993). As such, I worked hard to stress the impartiality of my research.

Some householders viewed me as an energy or technical consultant and asked my advice as to how to optimise their energy-efficiency and operate the installed technologies. For example, several households requested my advice as to how to operate their heating system. In these situations, I made suggestions where possible and advised householders to contact WHA for more detailed information. A third concern was that in some situations, where householders were challenged, I felt conflicted, as I wanted to help solve arising issues. These instances included: where households were suffering from thermal discomfort; were anxious due to energy bills that were higher than anticipated and that they were struggling to pay; and where I identified technical problems, particularly the failure of energy monitors to remain online. As opposed to reporting back my observations regarding individual households to WHA or BDC, so as not to breach confidentiality, I decided to broadly highlight to Adapt (the environmental consultancy) that it would be worth getting in contact with the Trinity Close residents to check on their progress.

A final concern was participants’ desire to discuss efficiency and the operation of particular installed technologies, as opposed to describing their actual practices. This demonstrated how the institutional rhetoric of energy-efficiency and technological optimism had, to some degree, become entrenched within, and begun to structure, the discourses and doings of the residents’ everyday lives. To get past this tendency, it was necessary for me to phrase interview questions in ways that would interrogate householders’ energy-related practices, and to sometimes provide examples by sharing details of my own practices.

When observing and conversing with the professional practitioners at Trinity Close, I also adopted different positions, which evolved throughout my involvement. When first gaining access to Trinity Close, I spoke with representatives from BDC and their environmental consultancy (Adapt). In this exchange, I was aware that Adapt had been commissioned to provide a technical appraisal of the initiative, was responsible for the

‘behaviour change’ element of the initiative⁹, and would be keen to form an affiliation to benefit from the results of my planned qualitative research. Both BDC and Adapt held particular ideas that my research would help validate the technical housing initiative. However I was conscious of retaining my independence as a researcher, not operating as a consultant, and not over-promising that I would share my research thoughts and findings with Adapt or BDC until they were formulated, particularly as I was interested in both organisations as Trinity Close stakeholders themselves. In my field notes I wrote,

“The Trinity Close Steering Group see me as an informant, but I need to be clear that this is independent and impartial research and I don’t want to negatively influence that process. What I can promise is to accurately take an account of the processes occurring on site according to my understandings and experiences”.

Initially Adapt insisted that they arranged all pilot tenant interviews. I was concerned that this initial contact would lead the householders to think I had been commissioned by the Trinity Close Steering Group (TCSG), and would hamper my research.

Fortunately, when Adapt struggled to contact the householders, the consultancy permitted me direct access to the residents. As my data collection process developed, and I grew familiar with happenings on the ground at Trinity Close, my researcher role evolved. Schwartz-Shea and Yanow (2012: 65) describe how a researcher’s role can vary from one where they participate as researcher alone, to adopting the ‘dual role of situational participant and researcher’. In between these two poles lies a repertoire of role combinations.

I experienced, and had to carefully negotiate, this range of roles as I developed ideas about the workings of Trinity Close. For example, in producing a report for BDC on my initial findings from the pilot household interviews (Macrorie, n.d., see Appendix A), during attended stakeholder meetings (see Table 3.8), and sometimes during

⁹ Subsequently the electricity performance monitoring appraisal was undertaken by an independent environmental

professional practitioner interviews, I was seen as an expert on low-energy (particularly domestic) housing practices. For example, during the interview with a senior planner at BDC, I was asked for my opinion on the merits of pursuing the CSH standard,

“I’d be interested in your thoughts, to take [a housing development] from Code four to Code six, do you get your value for money? Is that a good use of public money at this time?” (PP8, BDC).

I was also seen as a potential means to enhance communication channels with the residents (PP6, BDC), and my research was positioned by the TCSG as potentially informative to the future design decision-making processes in Broadland (PP9, DJH).

Whilst my position at the research site was never entirely stable or clear, in writing-up field notes, transcribing, and analysing my data away from Trinity Close, I was able to retain some critical distance (see Section 3.3.7).