Network 1000: the changing needs and circumstances of visually-impaired people: project overview

Abstract

This article outlines the progress of a newly-commissioned three year study known as Network 1000. It is a three-year project funded through the Community Fund and is being carried out by the University of Birmingham on behalf of Vision 2020. The project’s aim is to create a panel survey of 1000 visually-impaired people to be interviewed regularly over the three-year period, and hopefully beyond, enabling their changing needs and circumstances to be monitored over time. The findings will be used to influence policy-makers and service-providers, and will also be disseminated to a wider audience of people with an interest in visual impairment. Building on the longitudinal nature of the project enables the project team to develop a methodology that is both democratic and inclusive. The underlying research philosophy is one of inclusion and participation and in this respect the people this research affects the most - those who are visually impaired - are involved in all stages of the research process. People with a visual impairment have played a key role in generating the data and the themes that will drive the construction of the main survey instrument. The article is divided into five sections that describe the progress of the project to date: first, it briefly outlines the background to the project; second, it describes the underlying philosophy behind the democratic approach to inclusion and participant involvement; third, it presents preliminary results from generative interviews; fourth, it discusses how the team will recruit participants to the project with particular reference to the two-stage sample design that has been adopted; and finally, it describes how this two-stage approach will be operationalized. The article concludes by outlining the next phase of the project and with a short reflection on the research process to date.