News for the Critical Race Framework:
The Official Website

For Immediate Release
Contact: criticalraceframework@gmail.com

August 22, 2023

Dr. Christopher Williams, principal investigator for the Critical Race Framework study, held a second national webinar on August 22 to discuss his dissertation results. He provided an overview of the study aims, methodologies, and study findings.

Subsequent discussion centered on the study and expanded to include health equity, immigrant intersectionality, varying neighborhood and contextual factors, and viable subpopulations for public health research.

The Critical Race Framework study, led by Dr. Christopher Williams, is an innovative research project aimed at addressing gaps in public health literature regarding the use of racial taxonomy in research. This framework is designed as a bias tool to critically assess the reliability, validity, and overall quality of studies that incorporate race as a variable in data conceptualization, collection, analysis, and interpretation.

Objectives and Methodology

The study developed the Critical Race Framework (CRF) to provide a structured qualitative evaluation tool for research involving racial measures. The study was conducted in three iterative phases:

1. Phase I: A pilot study involving public health faculty and doctoral students to assess the initial measures of fit and identify areas for improvement in training, instrumentation, and study design.

2. Phase II: A national cross-sectional study with public health experts to evaluate the revised training and tool, assess demographic influences on perceptions, and gather validity evidence on constructs.

3. Phase III: Involved three raters performing article evaluations to support reliability evidence and assess the quality of health disparities and behavioral health research studies using the CR Framework.

Key Findings

• The study demonstrated excellent content validity but faced challenges in construct validity, particularly for reliability and validity items, which were rated as poor to fair.

• Interrater agreement was found to be moderate to high, although interrater reliability results were inconclusive due to a lack of confidence in significance testing.

• The framework showed implementation effectiveness and filled a major gap in public health literature by providing a theory-based tool and training.

Impact and Future Directions

Dr. Williams' work with the Critical Race Framework represents a significant advancement in public health research by offering a new approach to evaluating racial measures in studies. The framework aims to improve the quality of research and address systemic inequalities in health equity. Future research is encouraged to explore individual perceptions and practices influencing the outcomes of the CRF application and to reduce barriers for further testing.

Overall, the Critical Race Framework study by Christopher Williams is a pioneering effort to standardize critical evaluation in research studies using racial taxonomy, contributing significantly to the discourse on health equity and social justice.