"God will not change the fate of a nation unless the people change themselves”. The verse in the Holy Book becomes one of the basis for the holding of a community empowerment program in the form of participatory research in three villages in Bantul. The dissemination of this participatory research results is presented in one-day seminar on 10 September 2011 at Faculty of Psychology, Universitas Gadjah Mada.
This participatory research is aimed to understand the perceptions of community about their future, carried out in cooperation between team of researchers from Faculty of Psychology Universitas Gadjah Mada and Free University of Berlin, Germany. In this research, the public is invited to be involved directly in the research process, from formulating research questions, determining data collection methods, selecting respondents, analyzing activity up to drawing conclusions.
It is certaintly not easy to involve ordinary people who have obviously never been researchers and never thought of doing research. This becomes the duty of the task force and community organizer. That was said by Prof. Johana E. Prawitasari, Ph.D., Professor of Clinical Psychology of Faculty of Psychology UGM, who serves as chairman of this participatory research team. Each hamlet involved in this activity is led by one person from the task force and one person from community organizer, who is a young researcher from ICBC and INA Germany.
The three hamlets in Bantul which participated in this study were (1) Klisat in Srihardono, Pundong (2) Tlogo in Kebonagung, Imogiri, and (3) Kalipakel in Donotirto, Kretek. Each village is represented by some community researchers, including groups and individuals. It is noted there are nine community researchers consisting of youths, children, mothers, health cadres and farmers.
At the end of the process, the community researchers are encouraged to bring research results in the form of media that are presented back to community. The products they produced are in the form of books, posters, leaflets, and documentaries. To foster self-confidence, the resulting products are presented in an expo in the form of film screenings, presentations, poster exhibitions, and book launching in front of other residents.
It is also noted that the expo is conducted from 6 to 22 July 2011, attended by no less than 750 local residents and the German team. The seminar of participatory research dissemination is attended by 100 participants, including village officials, faculties, and students. The community researchers represented their work in the form of presentations and exhibitions. Posters and books, CDs documentaries and wall-magazine that they have produced would expand the insight of the audience. This is one alternative that can be done in community empowerment and intervention of community psychology.
Another thing in this seminar is the presentation of the results of quantitative research conducted by the research team of Clinical Psychology Section. The results of this second research are expected to more solidify the understanding of participatory research methods.