Participant learning in and through research as reflexive dialogue: Being ‘struck’ and the effects of recall

Abstract

Although learning as a dialogic process involving critical self-reflexivity is well recognized, enacting management learning in and through research dialogue with participants has been given limited attention. This article fuses, from related research, relational social constructionist understandings of knowing, learning and research to produce a framework of research as a dialogic process of learning. The framework emphasizes the importance of being ‘struck’ for participant-centred self-reflexivity and management learning. The framework is illustrated by drawing on empirical material from a research project involving five managers’ participation in a set of three research interviews. The research highlights the temporal and historical features of being ‘struck’ and the effect of recall in stimulating self-reflexivity and learning. The article also considers how participants and researchers may seize striking moments by illustrating direct and indirect ways of talking and acting which signal being ‘struck’.