SHOW ME the evidence: Features of an approach to reliably deliver research evidence to those who need it

Résumé fourni par la source

The world is poised for a step-change improvement in how we use evidence to address societal challenges. Given the speed at which plans are being made to support this once-in-a-generation transformation, the Implementation Council of the Global Commission on Evidence to Address Societal Challenges developed a working version of the features of an approach to reliably getting research evidence to those who need it and achieved consensus among leaders from the Implementation Council, as well as the Alliance for Living Evidence (Alive) Council and Evidence Synthesis International (ESI). Drawing an acronym from the first letter of each of the six features, the ‘SHOW ME the evidence’ features are as follows: 1. Support systems locally that use many forms of research evidence to help address local priorities 2. Harmonized efforts globally that make it easier to learn from others around the world 3. Open-science approaches that make it the norm to build on what others have done 4. Waste-reduction efforts that make the most of investments in evidence support and in research 5. Measured communications that clarify what we know from existing evidence and with what caveats 6. Equity and efficiency in all aspects of this work. The 100+ contributing authors from across the ‘evidence synthesis and support’ world want to ensure that our future plans are firmly rooted in an agreed-upon summary of all we have learned together over these past four or so years, and to signal a mutual accountability among many of the key players involved in providing evidence support that we will each do our part in delivering on the promise that motivates these plans. Given that much of the momentum for transformation is currently focused on living evidence syntheses and the infrastructure needed to support them, we give this form of evidence disproportionate focus here. An even more diverse set of partners should be engaged in designing and executing an inclusive process for the refinement or even reshaping of these features over time, as well as their ongoing operationalization. This includes more types of decision makers, those working with more forms of evidence, and funders, as well as even more contributors from across the Global South. 1. Support systems locally that use many forms of research evidence to help address local priorities Every jurisdiction needs a reliable evidence-support system to get whatever forms of evidence are needed to address a local priority into the hands of those who need it, when they need it, in whatever form they need it, and with any required caveats about its currency, quality, and local applicability.1 Locally can mean nations as well as subnational jurisdictions like provinces and cities. It can mean formal regional groupings of countries like the European Union and informal regional groupings of small countries with shared challenges. It can also mean systems, like the health or social-care system. The forms of evidence can include research evidence from the ‘local’ context (e.g. data analytics, evaluation, and behavioral or implementation research), research evidence from around the world (i.e. evidence synthesis), and other types of information (e.g. horizon scanning and people's lived experiences) and ways of knowing (e.g. Indigenous knowledge). Addressing a local priority is ideally informed by an understanding of a problem (and its causes and alternative ways of framing it), options to address the problem (including those already in use at a small scale), implementation considerations, and how to monitor implementation and evaluate impact. Research evidence can inform such understandings alongside political and social insights. Those who need research evidence can include government policy makers (from central agencies like Treasury, line departments like Education, and legislatures), organizational leaders (from both non-governmental organizations and private companies), professionals (like nurses, teachers, and veterinarians), and citizens (in the broadest sense of that term, and inclusive of undocumented individuals, as described in section 3.6 of the Global Evidence Commission report 2022). They also need enablers, culture, and capacity for evidence use. Many decision makers need actionable insights from research evidence quickly when a ‘window of opportunity’ opens. Sometimes these windows are open for days, other times weeks, and rarely for longer. Evidence support can now work at the same speed as decision-making processes. Some decision makers may want the evidence presented to them as ‘best buys’ (e.g. Global Education Evidence Advisory Panel), others by broad approach (e.g. Education Endowment Foundation), and still others by branded program (e.g. IES What Works Clearinghouse). Applicability can mean both for local contexts and for groups in a range of contexts, including groups most affected by historical and acute inequities. 2. Harmonized efforts globally that make it easier to learn from others around the world One aspect of evidence support that can now best be undertaken through harmonized efforts globally is to provide regularly updated summaries of what we have learned from around the world and how these findings vary by groups and contexts. ‘Living evidence synthesis’ is a relatively new approach to producing and maintaining these summaries.2 The take-up of this approach accelerated during the COVID-19 pandemic and continues to accelerate. Artificial intelligence (AI) has enabled some of this acceleration, and can continue to do so if done safely and responsibly. We revisit AI in feature 6. Groups of decision makers are beginning to come together to identify shared priorities and to call for living evidence syntheses that address these priorities. We are seeing this happen among United Nation (UN) agencies and their member states (through the Global SDG Synthesis Coalition), central agencies of government (through the Four-country commission), and international-assistance providers (indirectly through their chief economists or directly through their chief scientists). We foresee this happening in other areas like climate solutions and health technologies and in regions across the Global South. We hope the days will soon be gone when each organization separately commissioned or undertook its own rapidly outdated, often low-quality summaries, as well as when global-harmonization efforts are driven by a few dominant institutions or by a few high-income countries. We revisit this theme in feature 4. Groups of living evidence synthesis producers are now working collaboratively to meet the needs of decision makers. Longstanding leaders in the evidence-synthesis field, like the Campbell Collaboration and Cochrane, have reorganized themselves to do so; The Alliance for Living Evidence (Alive) is testing a new collaborative model. Evidence Synthesis International or another ‘umbrella’ body could help to further accelerate these service-oriented collaborations.3 Many groups are well positioned to share capacity in ways that ensure we achieve a distributed capacity for living evidence synthesis across low-, middle-, and high-income countries. Early movers and thought leaders are emerging among funders. For example, the Wellcome Trust has announced its intention to fund an evidence-synthesis infrastructure collaborative to support: 1) demand-side engagement through existing intermediaries; 2) data sharing and reusing; 3) safe and responsible use of AI; 4) methods and process innovation (e.g. related to equity considerations, context specificities, and feedback loops to primary researchers); and 5) capacity sharing through existing platforms. Such organizations are well poised to bring together a broad coalition of funders to invest in evolving suites of living evidence syntheses in areas prioritized by decision makers, and to invest in ways to serve actionable insights for diverse decision makers, sectors, regions, and languages. T

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