THEORETICAL AND PRAGMATIC IMPLICATIONS OF CULTURAL-DIVERSITY FOR COMMUNITY RESEARCH

Identifies several important issues commonly encountered, or overlooked, in conducting applied research with subgroups from varying cultural backgrounds. The process of creating cultural categories for comparative analyses that complement the research design, have heuristic salience, and extend the explanatory value of findings is reviewed Other issues discussed include vulnerabilities associated with using cognitive constructs and interpreting their meaning across cultural domains, methods of combining theory for intergroup and intragroup specific tests that facilitate synthesis without partitioning out cultural information, and implications of cultural diversity for designing, implementing, and interpreting results of community intervention trials. Recommendations for recognizing and overcoming common problems are supplied. The need for developing university-community partnerships to facilitate research and for maximizing end use of findings is emphasized.