In the last three decades, children's role within social research has changed significantly. Based on developments within children's rights and the ‘new social studies of childhood’, researchers have increasingly shifted from conducting research on children to research with children (Barker and Weller, 2003). This has involved recruiting children as research participants (Christensen and James, 2017; Wyness, 2019) and also sometimes for more active research roles, for example, as co-or peer researchers (Bradbury-Jones and Taylor, 2015; Dona, 2006). In the now well-established body of literature on research with and by children, power and the related notion of empowerment figure as key concepts. Three key themes dominate discussions. The first relates to power differences between children and adults in the research encounter and the need to minimize them through appropriate research methodologies and practices. The second describes power as something which can be ‘handed over’ to children in the research process and which has significant impact on the outcomes of the research. The third emphasises the empowering effect that involvement in research may have on the children who are involved. Where the first two predominantly focus on the research benefits of involving children as participants or active researchers, the last thus emphasises the positive impacts this may have for the children themselves.

Within all three themes, references to theoretical understandings of power and empowerment and in-depth analysis of how the two concepts may be operationalised in the context of children's participation in research are rare. The literature on children's participation includes a few explicit discussions and references to power theory, particularly with reference to Foucault and Giddens (Bradbury-Jones, 2014; Devine, 2003, 2002; Gallagher, 2008b; Meehan, 2016; Morgan and Sengedorj, 2015). However, discussions of empowerment from a theoretical perspective, and considerations of whether short-term gains from participating in a particular project may translate into wider and more long-term experiences of empowerment, are relatively absent. While the literature includes a wealth of well-constructed and important studies, which discuss and seek to challenge the power dynamics between children and adults within research, conclusions about children's subsequent level of power and empowerment therefore often remain partial.