Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2023 Dec;72(3-4):355-365.
doi: 10.1002/ajcp.12703. Epub 2023 Oct 3.

Mixed methods in community psychology: A values-forward synthesis

Shabnam Javdani  1 , Sadie E Larsen  2   3 , Nicole E Allen  4 , Allyson M Blackburn  5 , Breana Griffin  5 , Agnes Rieger  5
Affiliations

Mixed methods in community psychology: A values-forward synthesis

Shabnam Javdani et al. Am J Community Psychol. 2023 Dec.

Abstract

Mixed methods research (MMR) combines multiple traditions, methods, and worldviews to enrich research design and interpretation of data. In this virtual special issue, we highlight the use of MMR within the field of community psychology. The first MMR studies appeared in flagship community psychology journals over 30 years ago (in 1991). To explore the uses of MMR in the field, we first review existing literature by identifying all papers appearing in either Journal of Community Psychology or American Journal of Community Psychology in which the word "mixed" appeared. A total of 88 publications were identified. Many of these papers illustrate the pragmatic use of MMR to evaluate programs and to answer different research questions using different methods. We coded articles based on Green et al.'s classifications of the purpose of the mixing: triangulation, development, complementarity, expansion, and initiation. Complementarity was the most frequently used purpose (46.6% of articles), and nearly a quarter of articles mixed for multiple purposes (23.86%). We also coded for any community psychology values advanced by the use of mixed methods. We outline three themes here with corresponding exemplars. These articles illustrate how MMR can highlight ecological analysis and reconsider dominant, individual-level paradigms; center participant and community member experiences; and unpack paradoxes to increase the usefulness of research findings.

Keywords: community psychology; methods; mixed methods; qualitative; quantitative; values.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

CONFLICT OF INTEREST STATEMENT

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

FIGURE 1
FIGURE 1
Flowchart documenting identification, screening, and inclusion of articles reviewed (1991—February 2023). The 17 articles included in the virtual special issue (VSI) were selected from the 88 articles included in this review when they were exemplars of different mixed methods research design purposes, and when this VSI team was able to use them for rich conversation about mixed method research. Source: Adapted from The PRISMA Group (Moher et al., 2009; PRISMA-ScR; Tricco et al., 2018).
FIGURE 2
FIGURE 2
Relative frequency of purposes for mixed methods research in community psychology journals (1991–2023). The ordering of mixed methods purposes, as well as their relative size, convey how common each purpose was among the full set of articles reviewed (n = 88). Articles could be—and often were—coded as including multiple purposes.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. *Abraczinskas M, & Zarrett N (2020). Youth participatory action research for health equity: Increasing youth empowerment and decreasing physical activity access inequities in under-resourced programs and schools. American Journal of Community Psychology, 66(3–4), 232–243. - PMC - PubMed
    1. *Allen NE, Larsen SE, Javdani S, & Lehrner AL (2012). Council-based approaches to reforming the health care response to domestic violence: Promising findings and cautionary tales. American Journal of Community Psychology, 50, 50–63. - PubMed
    1. Allen NE, Walden A, Dworkin ER, & Javdani S (2016). Mixed methodology in multilevel, multisetting inquiry. Accepted for publication. In Jason L & Glenwick D (Eds.), Handbook of methodological approaches to community-based research: Qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods. Oxford University Press.
    1. *Anderson VR, Rubino LL, & McKenna NC (2020). Family-based intervention for legal system-involved girls: A mixed methods evaluation. American Journal of Community Psychology, 67(1–2), 35–49. - PubMed
    1. Barker C, & Pistrang N (2012). Methodological pluralism: Implications for consumers and producers of research. In Jason LA & Glenwick DS (Eds.), Methodological approaches to community-based research (pp. 33–50). American Psychological Association.

Publication types