The limitations of ‘barriers and enablers’ approaches in qualitative health research

Research questions framed as an exploration of barriers and enablers (or barriers and facilitators) to a desired health practice, implementation process or intervention outcome are increasingly prevalent. Explorations of barriers and enablers can be found in research relating to prevention and health promotion through to health services and clinical research. The barriers and enablers approach traverses qualitative research studies conducted for different purposes including problem description, co-design and evaluation. This increasing trend has reached the point where a barriers and enablers approach seems to be the default. In this presentation, we explored some of our concerns about the dominance of barriers and enablers approaches and suggest some possible alternatives and enhancements.

Watch the recording below or access here.

Dr Katherine Cullerton facilitated this event with guest speakers Dr Victoria Loblay (Brain and Mind Centre) and Dr Abby Haynes (Institute for Musculoskeletal Health) from the University of Sydney.

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