Aims & objectives

The overall aims of GoWell were:

To investigate the health and wellbeing impacts of regeneration activity associated with the Glasgow investment programme.
To understand the processes of change and implementation which contribute to (positive and negative) health impacts.

To contribute to community awareness and understanding of health issues and enable community members to take part in the programme.
To share best practice and knowledge of 'what works' with regeneration practitioners across Scotland on an ongoing basis.

GoWell evaluated change at three different levels: the individual or household, the neighbourhood or community and the city. And looked at it from the perspective of: the people involved, the places involved, and the processes taking place.

Our research objectives were:

To investigate how neighbourhood regeneration and housing investment affects individuals' health and wellbeing.
To access the degree to which places are transformed across a range of dimensions through processes of regeneration and housing improvement.
To understand the processes that support the maintenance or development of cohesive and sustainable communities.
To monitor the effects of regeneration policy on area-based health and social inequalities across Glasgow.
To develop and test research methods appropriate to the investigation of complex, area-based social policy interventions.

Our learning objectives were:

To distil learning from across the various components of GoWell, in a way that enables regeneration policy and implementation to take greater account of opportunities to improve health and wellbeing.
To make opportunities to influence policy across Government Directorates and at a regional and local level.
To facilitate capacity of the GoWell communities and their local structures to use learning in a way that empowers them.
To disseminate methodological developments and research findings to academic and practitioner audiences, through a range of written and verbal communications.