Impact review

A review of the impact of the research projects conducted through CREST.

Coming to the end of its fourth year of operation, the Centre for Research and Evidence on Security Threats sought to commission a review of the impact of its activities and outputs. Lucidity Solutions conducted the review and this report depicts the findings and recommendations.

The aim of the review was to better understand what impact CREST research has achieved, in individual projects, across the core programmes as well as commissioned projects. Information was gathered to inform the report from two online surveys, a series of interviews, and through existing data.

For the purpose of the review, impact has been considered in broad terms, drawing on a range of sources that are relevant to the social sciences and that provide different lenses through which impact can be evaluated.

This report sets out these findings and is accompanied by a set of case studies that demonstrate specific examples of where impact has been achieved, along with a suggested framework for a more systematic evaluation of impact.

The findings from the review demonstrate that there is strong evidence that CREST's research is delivering impact for end-users, enabling them to achieve changes in practice, advances in understanding, and development of skills and knowledge that they otherwise would not have been able to.

This review has demonstrated that CREST’s role as a national hub is valued highly by the funders and other stakeholders, and by the researchers involved, particularly in relation to the quality and range of CREST research, the impact it is achieving and the role that CREST is playing to support that impact.

It also includes recommendations to suggest ways that CREST could further enhance this national role.

You can download the Impact Review here: Download

*** This Impact Review was updated on 25/11/2019. Download links will redirect to the latest version ***

This review was written by Dr Jo Edwards, Lucidity Solutions Ltd and produced under a Creative Commons 4.0 BY-NC-SA licence. For more information on how you can use our content read our copyright page.