What does being "research active" mean in public health practice? Exploring behavioural and motivational dimensions of research activity in English local government through perceptions from embedded researchers.

Aim: Developing policies and services to address health inequalities occurs within highly complex, political environments, and the literature points to an underutilisation of research. This ineffective mobilisation of evidence is a result of challenges emerging from both research and practice organisations. In response, many interventions have been funded to enhance "research activity" in public health decision-making, but we lack a holistic understanding of what characterises research activity in these settings. Addressing this gap, we explored behavioural and motivational dimensions that are viewed as comprising research activity in public health practice. Subject and methods: We undertook seven semi-structured interviews with researchers embedded in local government settings in England. As change agents holding dual affiliations with research and practice organisations, embedded researchers are ideally placed to develop comparative insights on the processes through which research activity is manifested in these contexts and to identify disparities inhibiting the flow of research evidence into practice. Results: We found that research activity is manifested through a variety of behaviours relating to accessing, conducting, and contributing to research, and evidence use. Motivational dimensions underlying engagement with research institutions include concerns around capability, capacity, and local value. Many of these concerns stem partly from narrow conceptualisations of the term "research" which are held by academics and decision-makers alike. Conclusion: Interventions seeking to enhance research activity in public health decision-making could benefit from flexibility in their language and application to build cross-organisational understanding of pressures and priorities and to account for variation in research capacity, interest, and skillsets.