ROLE PLAY

© LOUIS COHEN, LAWRENCE MANION & KEITH MORRISON

STRUCTURE OF THE CHAPTER

• What is role play?• Why use role play in research?• Issues to be aware of when using role-play• Role-play as a research method• How does it work?• Important strategies for successful role-play• Three examples of research using role-play

WHAT IS ROLE PLAY• A ‘spontaneous, dramatic, creative teaching

strategy in which individuals overtly and consciously assume the roles of others’ (Sellers, 2002)

• Role play is an effective strategy for learning because it forces participants to think about the person whose role is being assumed, is connected to real-life situations, and promotes active, personal involvement in learning.

• Based on role taking, role making and role negotiation: useful for accessing and exploring people’s behaviour and responses to situations and stimuli in a diverse range of contexts and settings.

WHAT IS ROLE PLAY• Working in drama involves stepping into an

imagined world, a fictional reality, and in order to make this imaginary world more meaningful and purposeful in an educational research context, it must have aspects of the real world in it.

• Relationships are central:– between people– people and ideas– between people and the environment

STAGES IN ROLE PLAY

• Three stages:– Briefing– Acting– Debriefing

THE EDUCATIONAL USE OF DRAMA

• People involved in active role taking, where their attitude to the situation, not their ability to portray a character, is the chief concern.

• The role-play must be lived at life-rate (i.e. in that moment).

• The role-play must aim to create a living picture of life, which provides a learning opportunity for the participant as much as for any onlookers, including the researcher.

• Role-play is improvisational in nature and increasingly unscripted.

WHY USE ROLE-PLAY IN RESEARCH?• To help participants consider ideas from

different perspectives, to think of possibilities.• To experience how people behave in particular

circumstances by exploring a variety of social situations and social interactions.

• To explore a range of human feelings and responses to situations.

• To explore choices and moral dilemmas• To make decisions which are tested out in the

role-play and later reflected on.

WHY USE ROLE-PLAY IN RESEARCH?• To develop a sense of responsibility and

confidence as decision makers and problem solvers.

• To develop personal creativity.• To improve the social health of a group and

foster improved relationships with peers or colleagues.

• To interact with peers and learn to compromise in order to sustain and develop activities.

• To extend, enrich and prompt the use of authentic language use in simulated real life contexts.

WHY USE ROLE-PLAY IN RESEARCH?

• To explore the skills and processes involved in conflict, negotiation and resolution of difficulties and problems in their environment.

• To develop agency and an increased awareness of self.

• To improve visual and spatial skills through responding to a range of stimuli and situations.

• Role-play operates in a ‘no-penalty zone’, where people are freer to explore and try out a range of solutions to problems and issues, without having to worry about the outcome.

ISSUES TO BE AWARE OF WHEN USING ROLE-PLAY

• Ethical issues– Informed consent– Overt/covert research– Non-maleficence (do no harm) and beneficence– Vulnerability and dignity of participants

• The researcher must act responsibly.• Draw the line between illusion and reality, but

make sure that there is some reality in the illusion.

CONDUCTING ROLE-PLAY

• Set the scene• Narrate the dramatic frame• Provide a ‘second dimension’ for each role• Outline the dilemma• Dramatic tension• Objective of each participant• Constraint• Hidden objectives

ROLE-PLAY AS A RESEARCH METHOD

• Explore the principles of human behaviour in real life settings, lived at life-pace;

• Access and assess how people make sense of their lives, and the structures of the natural world;

• Prioritize the process of engagement; • Explore different points of view, and forge

different types of knowledge; • Adopt multiple viewing points within a data set; • Study multi-level communication;

ROLE-PLAY AS A RESEARCH METHOD

• Identify and explore the development and manifestation of participants’ attitudes, decisions, strategies, values, thinking skills, and emotions;

• Shift and alter variables as the research unfolds, to explore subtleties and nuances in human interactions and situations;

• provide planned or spontaneous prompts and stimuli to participants;

• Engage with a fully diverse research population through an inclusive method to explore and access relevant data;

ROLE-PLAY AS A RESEARCH METHOD

• Explore meanings and the ways in which people understand things;

• Investigate patterns of behaviour; • Provide a distancing lens through which to

interpret material; • Examine ready-made, visually and narratively rich

research data, which evoke layers of meaning through reflection;

• Capture visual data; • Involve participants as co-researchers;• Engage in meaningful interaction with participants.

HOW DOES ROLE-PLAY WORK? • Brief participants on:

– The purpose of taking on the role

– The status or level of power of the role

– The attitude of the role

– The participant’s motivation in the role-play

• A loosely structured role-play places more demands on participants, and thus requires greater preparation.

• The effectiveness of role play is dependent on careful planning and the educator’s ability to convey confidence to participants that role play can be a valuable strategy.

IMPORTANT STRATEGIES FOR SUCCESSFUL ROLE-PLAY

• Inserting dramatic tension and awakening participants’ self-spectator

• Protection into (not ‘from’) role and protection into emotion

• Ensure adequate preparation• Attention to detail and practicalities