Paper short abstract:

The paper examines how valuation is achieved when multidisciplinary research projects negotiate research questions, methods, data quality and results. It explores a series of cases and attempts to develop a typology of the ‘value added’ to valuation by social scientists.

Paper long abstract:

Despite all the demands in science policy for multidisciplinarity, 'strategic research', 'integration of approaches' and collaborative engagement, it would be no overstatement to say that the formats for collaboration between different scientific fields and disciplines are still very much on the margins. When researchers from different disciplines collaborate there are no universally accepted recipes for reaching agreement on the relevance of a research question, the quality of dataset, the appropriateness of a method, or the trustworthiness of a prediction of the outcome. But valuations nevertheless take place; decisions are made, procedures are chosen, matters are organized, and claims of knowledge are stated.

In this paper we examine how marginal valuation practices are achieved in multidisciplinary research.

First, we review some of the literature on how qualitative social science may be combined with other research endeavours (Law 2004, Sherman & Strang 2004, Bryman 2006, Balmer et al. 2016)

Second, we examine a series of practical attempts to frame and organize a particular format of collaboration between social scientists and other contributors. These cases include qualitative screening interviews in randomized clinical trails (Jespersen et al., forthcoming), digital ethnography (Elgaard Jensen, forthcoming), and exploratory 'data sprint' workshops (Munk et al. 2016). In each case we explore the politics of inclusion and exclusion, the crafting of devices, and the emerging division of labor and roles.

Third, we take some preliminary steps towards a typology of the 'value added' to valuation practices by social scientists.