Beyond the data: Research methods that understand women's lives

A few years ago, I was privileged to evaluate a women’s economic empowerment programme. I will never forget Adanna's face when she handed in her loan repayment. For months, she had been participating in the programme. According to our surveys, she represented a perfect success story - regular attendance and timely repayments. But her eyes told a different story.

"Please," she whispered, "do not give me another loan."

Later, I learnt the truth. Her husband had forbidden her from using the money. That first loan sat untouched under her mattress, hidden away because she feared what might happen if she started a business. When repayment day arrived, she sold her only gold earrings to get the money. The data showed a woman repaying a loan, but the reality revealed a woman paying to maintain peace in her home.

This experience mirrored what I witnessed years earlier with a farming cooperative. Women were leaving, and our surveys could not explain why. The data showed their departure but not the patriarchal pressures behind it - husbands who controlled mobility, who objected to their wives speaking with male researchers, who grew uncomfortable seeing them leave home smartly dressed. Some women received loans but kept the money under their mattresses, too afraid of domestic consequences to invest it. When repayment came due, they found the interest money elsewhere and returned the principal untouched, never multiplying the opportunity.

These experiences taught me that traditional research often captures what happens but rarely reveals why it happens. Effective gender equality research must listen to silence and observe what remains unspoken, grounding itself in the real contexts where patriarchal norms shape daily life.

Approaches that reveal hidden truths

Research for gender equality demands methods that uncover not just actions but motivations, not just behaviours but the power structures that shape them. Through years of work across African communities, we have identified approaches that actually work because they respect women's realities.

Kitchen table conversations have proven invaluable. Instead of formal interviews in offices, we sit with women in their homes, drinking tea, waiting for children to finish playing. In these ordinary moments, women share extraordinary truths. One woman in northern Nigeria finally confessed she could not visit the health clinic because her husband believed the nurses would provide contraception. No standard survey would have captured this crucial barrier.

Community mapping provides another powerful tool. When women draw their daily movements with coloured pens and paper, they reveal invisible boundaries - the road avoided after dark, the market stall skipped due to harassment, the well abandoned because of uncomfortable encounters. These maps document the spatial manifestations of gender inequality that numbers alone cannot capture.

Participatory Action Research takes this further by treating community members as co-researchers. They help define questions, collect data, and analyse findings. This approach builds local ownership and ensures research addresses genuine concerns rather than external assumptions. When combined with quantitative methods through mixed-methods approaches, we get both the breadth of statistics and the depth of personal stories.

In our maternal health work in northern Nigeria, surveys showed low clinic attendance, but focus groups revealed women needed their husband's permission to travel. The numbers showed the what, while the conversations revealed the why.

From insight to meaningful change

Research means nothing if it does not spark transformation. After understanding Adanna's situation, we completely redesigned our economic programme. We began holding meetings with husbands and wives together, created savings groups instead of individual loans, and established a community centre where women could work without explaining their whereabouts.

The results astonished us. Women's businesses genuinely flourished, with loan usage increasing by seventy percent. More importantly, we witnessed husbands becoming allies rather than obstacles. One man even asked if his wife could train other women in her successful cloth-dyeing business.

This is what feminist research looks like in practice - not complicated academic theories but practical approaches that recognise how gender intersects with race, class, age, and disability. It requires designing research instruments that capture multiple identity factors, analysing data by subgroups, and collaborating with organisations that represent diverse communities.

We must acknowledge practical constraints like budget and time limitations, focusing on one method done well rather than multiple methods done poorly. Technology can help when used thoughtfully - mobile surveys that reach remote areas, SMS-based surveys for basic network coverage, community data collectors with tablets for offline work - but we must remain mindful of the digital divide that often excludes women.

Good research transforms researchers as much as communities. It demands humility, willingness to admit what we do not know, and courage to sit with discomfort. It means listening to what women do not say, noticing who sits in the corner during meetings, understanding that a woman's "no" might mean "I cannot say yes safely," and recognising that the most important data often comes through tears or silence.

I still think about Adanna and the women from the farming cooperative. They taught me that behind every data point lives a person navigating complex relationships and cultural expectations. Our work as researchers is not just to collect numbers but to understand lives. When we do this well, we help create a world where women like Adanna can keep their gold earrings and invest their loans, where they can speak their truths without fear, where research becomes not just a tool for understanding but for genuine liberation.