Community Engagement in Health Promotion: Results from a Realist Multiple Case Study

Table 1

Research steps, methods, sources, and primary outputs.

Step	What	Methods and by whom	Sources	Primary outputs
1	Case selection	Purposive sampling; selection based on four criteria; (i) LH, LV, and MK	(1) Categorisation of projects (previous study)	Selected cases, 3 from 46: Project A
			(2) Project proposals	Project B
			(3) Group interviews round 1	Project C
2	Data collection	Multiple telephone interviews and group sessions (see also Tables 2 and 3); Collection of available project documents and reports; (i) LH, LV, CL, and other researchers from the research consortium of the overall evaluation
3	Identifying a combined ToC	Analysis of data using interpretive content analysis and primarily deductive coding of texts	(1) Project proposals	(1) Visual representation of ToC
		(i) LH	(2) Groups interviews round 1	(2) List with main assumptions
4	Thematic analysis based on realist principles	Analysis of data based on realist principles and guided by the ToC: identifying (related) mechanisms, context, outcomes, and inputs (ICMO configurations) that can be linked to parts of the ToC; (i) LH and LV	(1) Group interviews round 2-3	List of identified (i) CMO configurations
			(2) Telephone interviews round 1–3
			(3) Progress reports
			(4) Final evaluation report by project
5	Creating a refined ToC	Linking identified (I) CMO configurations to the ToC when possible, to create the refined ToC; (i) LH	List of identified (I) CMO configurations	Visual representation of parts of the refined ToC

LH, LV, and MK are authors and worked as researcher or project leader in the overall evaluation team. CL worked as a research assistant in the research consortium of the overall evaluation.