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Research has certainly played a significant role in community-based projects. In community and public health promotion, scientific studies are often regarded as a central source of information for policymakers (McGann and Weaver 2000). The results of many research projects are viewed as supplying basic information that helps scientists, community members, and public and private health agencies in their decision-making. In this sense, social research has been depicted in an instrumental fashion—that is, it represents a tool used to assist those most closely involved in community health projects. Even activists, who oppose the top-down nature of traditional healthcare delivery, give primary importance to the technical side of research (Friedman 1994). Statistics and data collection techniques are central ways that local realties are captured and communicated to the larger public.

DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-61557-8_3

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