Engaging young carers in public health research through online lyric writing workshops during the COVID-19 pandemic

Abstract

Understanding and effectively communicating population health research findings require engagement with the lived experiences of study participants, particularly when working with under-represented groups like young carers. This challenge was amplified during the COVID-19 lockdowns. To address this, we undertook a feasibility study, involving 46 young carers across 24 online creative lyric-writing workshops. Our approach combined narrative storytelling with rhythm and poetry (RAP) to co-produce creative outputs such as lyrics, aiming to engage participants with health and wellbeing research findings. Observations and interviews collected using bricolage methodology were used to capture professional and participant perspectives. The data were analysed using grounded theory. Our finding revealed that co-production and lyric-writing served as effective tools in communicating epidemiological data. We identified four key enablers in this process: connectedness, accomplishment, self-expression and societal engagement. This study underscores the potential of skills-based lyric-writing in enhancing science communication and public engagement with under-represented groups.

Keywords

• Young carers
• wellbeing
• music
• public engagement
• COVID-19