Research methods innovation

NCRM conducts a wide range of activities to support innovation in research methods. These initiatives play a key role in the centre’s core mission of advancing methodological practice in the social sciences and beyond.

We provide funding for researchers who are developing new methodologies, gather insight on the latest opportunities and challenges, and collaborate with other organisations on major national projects.

Since NCRM was founded in 2004, the centre has conducted and overseen a huge number of research projects. These have enhanced and developed existing methods, pioneered new approaches and established innovative practices for teaching research methods.

On this page, you can find more information on our innovation activities and their outputs, which include videos, guidance documents, papers and reports.

Collaborative projects

In addition to our own projects, we work with leading organisations across the UK on major initiatives that focus on areas of strategic importance. These areas include survey methods and approaches to life-course research.

NCRM's impact

By advancing methods and boosting researchers’ skills, NCRM aims to have wider impacts. These range from professional development for individuals to facilitating research with economic, societal, policy or cultural benefit.

Our innovation and research activities help researchers across various disciplines and sectors to apply new or improved methods to diverse research projects. Recent examples include the development of machine learning approaches for clinical data, the growth of decolonial research methods and applications of creative, arts-based or visual methods.

Find out more about NCRM’s impact