Implementation Science as a Research Methodology: A Scoping Review of the Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research (CFIR)

Abstract

The use of implementation science has long been used for studying the effectiveness of medical/health related initiatives, yet it has not yet been widely used for broad studies of the impacts of business reforms or educational initiatives (Walters, W. & Barber, W. 2025). Policy reforms are constantly changing, however analysis of these reforms has not been consistently measured to assess implementation success. The purpose of this scoping literature review is to examine the breadth of existing literature related to Implementation Science, and further the instrument used to measure program impact, the Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research (CFIR), and to explore how these commonalities and research strategies used in health care settings might be applied to other sectors. The CFIR is a comprehensive  taxonomy of operationally defined constructs that may impact the implementation success of complex programs. The CFIR defines five domains (intervention characteristics, outer setting, inner setting, characteristics of individuals and process), each with constructs and some sub-constructs which can affect implementation success. To date, the CFIR has been applied to a wide variety of quantitative, qualitative and mixed healthcare-related studies for a variety of purposes across five domains. In summary, the authors contend that the CFIR can be modified as a new research methodology for measuring program impact across a broad range of sectors.