Productive Disagreement During Research in Interdisciplinary Teams: Notes from a Case Study Investigating Pornography and Healthy Sexual Development.

This article reports on an interdisciplinary project that conducted a series of systematic reviews of academic research about the use of pornography and sexual health. Academics from a variety of disciplines were involved; half of the team had a background in humanities and the other half a background in psychology. While working closely together, they realized that they disagreed on many different matters, such as how to ask questions, how to use definitions, what count as data, what counts as a good outcome in research, how to structure an academic article, and how to use other academics' work. This article reports on the team members' use of reflective practice to analyze their responses to these disagreements and suggests that such disagreements can be seen as positive and productive in interdisciplinary research as they may facilitate collaboration among those representing different disciplines. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]