Longitudinal studies of human health and wellbeing are typically conducted over many years or decades, with the purpose being to identify how the timing and sequence of events contribute to the onset of ill-health disease. Evidence from longitudinal studies are increasingly being used to inform public and social policy, and yet there are concerns about the level of Māori involvement in longitudinal studies, from research participation to governance (Theodore et al., 2019). Similar concerns have been raised for the voices of Pacific and other ethnic minority groups as being under-represented in national health surveys (Mhurchu et al., 2009).

The purpose of this project is to document involvement of participants from different ethnic groups in the longitudinal study Growing Up in New Zealand (GUiNZ). The project will include:
(1) a scoping review examining participation in existing national and international longitudinal studies;
(2) a quantitative analysis of response and retention rates by ethnicity in the GUiNZ study;
3) a quantitative analysis of factors contributing to non-response and attrition of participants by ethnic group.

The researchers will analyse response and non-response rates at each DCW separately for participants by ethnic group as well as retention rates over time. The analysis will also identify the factors that contribute to non-response and attrition of participants by ethnic group. The quantitative findings will be useful for informing strategies to support Māori, Pacific and Asian (re-)engagement in future DCWs for GUiNZ and to support new research projects that explore questions of importance for Māori, Pacific and Asian health wellbeing. The research will inform a new programme being led by this team to identify pathways and trajectories for rangatiratanga.

References:
Theodore, R., Ratima, M., Edwards, W., Sporle, A., Te Morenga, L., Kiro, C., Hond, R. (2019) How a lifecourse approach can promote long-term health and wellbeing outcom