Leisure or Livelihoods: Aims
Aim 1
To use a participatory action research (PAR) approach, informed by evidence gathered by the research team, to explore the changing significance of gambling in the lives of young people and their communities in Ghana and Malawi. This will include examining how participation in gambling practices can have wider implications for individual and community well-being, conceptions of work, approaches to livelihood and prospects for social mobility
Aim 2
To produce comparative insights into the lived relationships between young people and gambling in two urban regions of Ghana and Malawi, evaluating how youth perceptions towards, and participation in, gambling practices are shaped by wider social-economic, technological and cultural factors at both a local and a global scale
Aim 3
To foster equitable forms of youth and community engagement with academic research and policy- making processes by creating a platform for young people to engage with, conduct and disseminate research. Central to this will be the opportunity to share their co-creative project outputs to stimulate critical reflection on the differentiated societal impacts of gambling in Ghana and Malawi, and highlight the potential risks posed by the associated normalisation of gambling behaviours
Aim 4
To create a precedent for equitable international and interdisciplinary forms of academic and non-academic collaboration in gambling research, contributing novel theoretical and methodological insights that reach across the social sciences, public health, social policy and the arts and humanities.