What does CA:RING do?
CA:RING helps researchers involve members of the public in planning and interpreting their research and help them keep the public informed about their studies in plain terms.
Involving members of the public is increasingly becoming an expectation of high-quality research, because people know their own lives better than researchers do. The experiences of people from under-served groups tend to be particularly overlooked. This means that they are often not well represented in Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) and research is less likely to benefit them.
At CA:RING we are committed to including people from all sorts of backgrounds and communities to help make research more fair, ethical and inclusive.
How did CA:RING get started?
CA:RING grew out of a Patient and Public Involvement project our team ran in 2022. We received far more interest than we ever anticipated: 190 sign-ups when we only needed 30! This made us realise that people care about getting involved in research far more than researchers might think. We already knew how difficult researchers often find involving the public, and young people in particular. We decided to set up CA:RING in response to this.
What are the problems we’re trying to solve?
💡 Researchers are expected to include members of the public in their research, but often don’t have any experience or know where to get started. We will help put them on the right track.
💡 If public representatives or researchers have a bad experience working with each other, this can sour them on getting involved in the future. We will work closely with our Advisory Group to make sure everyone gets the most out of CA:RING.
💡 Researchers often simply don’t have the resources to involve the public, even if they want to. We’re doing most of the leg-work.
💡 Researchers sometimes think that young people can’t meaningfully contribute to their research because it’s too complicated. We stand by the quote “If you can’t explain it simply, then you don’t understand it well enough.”
What’s in it for young people and parents?
✓ An opportunity to learn about and shape research which could affect you or people like you
✓ Learn something new and pick up new skills
✓ Meet like-minded people and feel part of a community
What’s in it for researchers?
✓ Our support and experience to find effective ways of involving young people, parents and guardians in your research
✓ No need to recruit participants from scratch
✓ Valuable insights from people from diverse backgrounds and experiences
