Resonant Research in Uncertain Times: Reflections on Relational Research Practices During a Pandemic

This paper reflects on how one interdisciplinary research team restructured a simulation-based study involving actor-portrayed counselling sessions with social work students and practitioners in response to the disruptions of the COVID-19 pandemic, and the needs of participants and team members to repair fractured connections to themselves and others. We read our experiences alongside Harmut Rosa’s work on Resonance and the concept of Slow Scholarship to explore how our team balanced the pressures of academia in the pandemic and the needs of participants and researchers. Conducted in the context of social work education, the study involved transitioning from in-person to online methods while centering care, containment, and collaboration among team members and participants. We detail three core practices—dedicated containment of research tasks, paid time for relationship-building, and paid reflexive debriefing—that allowed us to attend to the human dimensions of the research process. Using a collaborative feminist reflexivity approach, we argue that ethical and rigorous research must include compensation for the unseen labor of trust-building and critical analysis, particularly during periods of social crisis. This reflection contributes to broader calls for research as a form of relational repair, offering a model for resonant engagement within the neoliberal academy.