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<p>Reflexivity enhances our understanding of qualitative research, adds to its trustworthiness and promotes ethical research practice. Despite calls to engage in reflexivity practice in deep and meaningful ways, reflexity remains poorly practiced and/or reported in the Health Professions Education (HPE) literature. Possible explanations for this are that reflexivity is poorly understood, or that researchers do not know where to begin. This article highlights positionality as the starting point to the practice of reflexivity. Positionality is the position that researchers hold – <i>at any one time</i> – in relation to the research project (topic, participants, context and processes), influenced by the intersection of their multiple identities, experiences, viewpoints and beliefs. Identifying researchers’ positionality is important, especially regarding their <i>insider</i> or <i>outsider</i> status and the impact of their positionality on their research. However, positionality is fluid and requires time to identify. This article discusses positionality, shifting positionality and the impact on research and presents a worked example of an empirical qualitative study with International Medical Graduates (IMGs) and explores the use of theory – specifically <i>Social Identity Complexity Theory (SICT)</i> - as a lens to aid the identification of researcher positionality. The article concludes with a tool that uses <i>SICT</i> to aid researchers – especially novices – to identify their own positionality and continuously reflect on it throughout the research process with the ultimate aim of facilitating deeper and more meaningful reflexivity practice in HPE research.</p>

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Positionality using the lens of social identity complexity theory: a worked example

  • 期刊论文

  • 发表日期：

    2026年1月10日

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  • Mo Al-Haddad,
  • Susan Jamieson,
  • Evi Germeni

摘要

Reflexivity enhances our understanding of qualitative research, adds to its trustworthiness and promotes ethical research practice. Despite calls to engage in reflexivity practice in deep and meaningful ways, reflexity remains poorly practiced and/or reported in the Health Professions Education (HPE) literature. Possible explanations for this are that reflexivity is poorly understood, or that researchers do not know where to begin. This article highlights positionality as the starting point to the practice of reflexivity. Positionality is the position that researchers hold – at any one time – in relation to the research project (topic, participants, context and processes), influenced by the intersection of their multiple identities, experiences, viewpoints and beliefs. Identifying researchers’ positionality is important, especially regarding their insider or outsider status and the impact of their positionality on their research. However, positionality is fluid and requires time to identify. This article discusses positionality, shifting positionality and the impact on research and presents a worked example of an empirical qualitative study with International Medical Graduates (IMGs) and explores the use of theory – specifically Social Identity Complexity Theory (SICT) - as a lens to aid the identification of researcher positionality. The article concludes with a tool that uses SICT to aid researchers – especially novices – to identify their own positionality and continuously reflect on it throughout the research process with the ultimate aim of facilitating deeper and more meaningful reflexivity practice in HPE research.