Taking the visual turn in research and scholarly communication key issues in developing a more visually literate (social) science

This article identifies some major impediments on the road to more visually literate forms of research and scholarly communication and advances some ideas for improvement. These recommendations relate to each of the following issues: the indispensable awareness for the magnitude of types of visual representations and their distinct implications, the need for clarifying the role of aesthetics in a scientific discourse, the need for a more explicit visual methodology and theory, the crucial role of technology, the importance of staying tuned with our audiences, and of fostering a thoughtful eclecticism and interdisciplinary exchange.

Making progress in each of these domains will result in an improved “visual scientific literacy,” a term that could be used to denote a set of skills and attitudes which manifests itself as very proficient visual thinking and acting throughout the complete research process. More visually literate scholars will be able to take better advantage of visual reality as a field for research and of the growing supply of representational tools and techniques to make sense of it and to communicate about it in an appropriate manner.     

On the relation between ‘visual research methods’ and contemporary visual culture

One of the most striking developments across the social sciences in the past decade has been the growth of research methods using visual materials. It is often suggested that this growth is somehow related to the increasing importance of visual images in contemporary social and cultural practice. However, the form of the relationship between ‘visual research methods’ and ‘contemporary visual culture’ has not yet been interrogated. This paper conducts such an interrogation, exploring the relation between ‘visual research methods’ – as they are constituted in quite particular ways by a growing number of handbooks, reviews, conference and journals – and contemporary visual culture – as characterized by discussions of ‘convergence culture’. The paper adopts a performative approach to ‘visual research methods’. It suggests that when they are used, ‘visual research methods’ create neither a ‘social’ articulated through culturally mediated images, nor a ‘research participant’ competency in using such images. Instead, the paper argues that the intersection of visual culture and ‘visual research methods’ should be located in their shared way of using images, since in both, images tend to be deployed much more as communicational tools than as representational texts. The paper concludes by placing this argument in the context of recent discussions about the production of sociological knowledge in the wider social field.     

Repositioning the research encounter: exploring power dynamics and positionality in youth research

Childhood and youth studies have seen the development of a range of innovative research methods over the past two decades. However, many studies have focused on the ideals of empowerment and ‘giving voice’ rather than developing understandings of the nuanced and complex experiences of children and youth. This paper argues that the development of an insightful sociology of childhood and youth necessitates an understanding of complex, fluid, and often political, processes of youth experience. It argues that the use of research methods characterized by a variety of power dynamics can generate situated knowledges of youth experience. Ongoing reflexive analysis of researcher and participant positionality in research encounters is posited as affording insightful and in-depth research perspectives. This is illustrated through discussion of qualitative research carried out with Muslim teens in the west of Ireland which involved the use of focus groups, visual narratives and an online blog site.     

We've been framed: visualising methodology1

This paper explores the reasons why video, and other visual representations have been largely ignored in sociology, whilst the possibilities of video as an empirical source have been sidelined by cultural studies. Discussions of methodology have raised doubts about notions such as objectivity and scientific knowledge, and about the power relationships involved in the research and writing processes, and techniques that one might employ in order to avoid such problems have been suggested. Yet the aims of such techniques are misguided if they serve only to further legitimate the 'truth' of the research itself. In this context I explore some of the possibilities of visual methods, such as video and photography, whilst also examining some of the ethical issues raised by them. In this respect, the paper explores the notion of a 'queer methodology'. This approach is indebted to the legacy of its predecessor, feminist methodology, but departs from this in several important ways. I will explore these differences and examine the possibility that a place for the visual within sociology is an inherently queer conception.     

Measuring societal effects of transdisciplinary research projects: design and application of an evaluation method

Most Transdisciplinary Research (TdR) projects combine scientific research with the building of decision making capacity for the involved stakeholders. These projects usually deal with complex, societally relevant, real-world problems. This paper focuses on TdR projects, which integrate the knowledge of researchers and stakeholders in a collaborative transdisciplinary process through structured methods of mutual learning. Previous research on the evaluation of TdR has insufficiently explored the intended effects of transdisciplinary processes on the real world (societal effects). We developed an evaluation framework for assessing the societal effects of transdisciplinary processes. Outputs (measured as procedural and product-related involvement of the stakeholders), impacts (intermediate effects connecting outputs and outcomes) and outcomes (enhanced decision making capacity) are distinguished as three types of societal effects. Our model links outputs and outcomes of transdisciplinary processes via the impacts using a mediating variables approach. We applied this model in an ex post evaluation of a transdisciplinary process. 84 out of 188 agents participated in a survey. The results show significant mediation effects of the two impacts "network building" and "transformation knowledge". These results indicate an influence of a transdisciplinary process on the decision making capacity of stakeholders, especially through social network building and the generation of knowledge relevant for action.     

Offshoring in the core: Russian software firms onshoring in the USA

Offshoring and outsourcing have become the buzzwords of the IT community and the popular media discourse about the current era of globalization in services. Acknowledging the geographic perspective expressed in these dominant terms, in this article I examine the processes and activities that are oriented in the opposite direction. Capturing this inversion, I develop the concept of ‘onshoring’ and use research material from fieldwork conducted with IT firms in St Petersburg, Russia and their affiliates, agents and clients in the USA to provide an empirical case study. Onshoring encompasses the corporeal, representational, material and legal practices of offshore firms developing a presence onshore, with Russia as offshore and the USA as onshore in this case. The lack of an established Russian professional diaspora in the USA created a context in which developing a recognizable onshore presence was necessary for firms based in Russia. By explicitly recognizing that the efforts, risk‐taking and experimental strategies of offshore firms to create connections, networks and contacts onshore in the USA are a constitutive part of offshore outsourcing, I document and examine the less acknowledged complex flows and practices of onshoring. I argue that although these actors and processes may seem marginal to the widely recognized narrative of offshore outsourcing, in fact, they are creative and strategic compensations that reveal how the globalization of services is enacted at the micro‐level.     

Reframing Tri Hita Karana: From ‘Balinese Culture’ to Politics

This article takes issue with the uncritical way in which claims of ‘culture’, ‘tradition’ or ‘local knowledge’ are used in science and policymaking around the Balinese irrigators' association (subak). The growing problems of Balinese irrigated agriculture are increasingly framed in ‘cultural’ ways that are not neutral: such accounts of irrigated agriculture in relation to Balinese culture deeply influence the world of policymaking. In this article we discuss the emergence of Tri Hita Karana (THK; ‘the three causes of well-being’) as an ideology, scientific concept and policy concept in irrigated agriculture and the subak domain. We argue that this ideological concept is not simply ‘local wisdom’, ‘tradition’ or ‘culture’ but requires critical scientific scrutiny as part of wider processes of socio-political change. How is it mobilised? What does its growing popularity mean for our knowledge of Balinese irrigated agriculture, of policy processes directed at the subak and of the workings of policies in real-life contexts?     

Implementing a Knowledge Management System in a School of Social Work: The Possibilities,Challenges, and Lessons Learned

Managing emerging scientific, professional, and applied practice knowledge has become increasingly more important in the 21st century because economic and social connections in organizations are becoming more complex, associated with greater global connectivity. One approach to this growing complexity and emerging need involves the development of a technology-based knowledge management (KM) system. This paper describes one human service organization's attempt to implement and capture the complex knowledge needs and requirements for a knowledge management system. The implementation described is in the third year of a five year process. The challenges when incorporating such reorganization will be addressed. This case example also illustrates the complexities, possibilities, and lessons learned while implementing a knowledge management system within a school of social work and subsequently its capacity to be transferred to human service organizations.     

Decentering Power in Research with Criminalized Women: A Case for Photo-Elicitation Interviewing

ABSTRACT

This article contributes to the project of developing a visual criminology that reclaims social relationships and the humanity and visibility of criminalized people and strives to disrupt the ideological and political underpinnings of mass incarceration and the state’s reliance on punitive responses to social inequality. Using photo-elicitation interviewing (PEI), I draw on qualitative research with 36 formerly incarcerated women living in Chicago. I review PEI’s potential to disrupt the power differential between researchers and participants and to include research participants as collaborators in knowledge production. I examine how limitations imposed by an Institutional Review Board created ethical concerns about representing women’s images and constrained women’s role in the coproduction of knowledge. I argue that PEI based on participant-generated images can help to overcome some of the ethical and methodological tensions encountered in visual criminology.     

Elder Abuse:

Elder abuse in Québec has been defined as a social problem since the late 70s. Many changes in policies, social practices, and laws are proposed as scientific knowledge is still growing. Using research methodology in criminology, elder abuse is defined and the impact of violence and neglect towards elders in the community, family and nursing home settings investigated. This paper critically examines the current knowledge gained through research on elder abuse in Québec and offers suggestions for future progress on this issue.     

‘Value talk’ in social work research: reflection,rhetoric and reality

This paper begins with an exploration of values in relation to current approaches within social work research thereby revealing tensions between what might broadly be conceived as scientific rigour and relevance to practice. It goes on to examine the purpose of social work research emphasising the notion of the researcher as engaged in a critically reflective dialogic process. Four core values conceived as guiding principles in undertaking research are identified as the basis for further ‘value talk’ in the context of developing culturally sensitive approaches without relinquishing a common sense of purpose in developing knowledge of and for social work practice.     

Dignity in dementia: Person-centered care in community

Drawing on Kitwood's [Ageing Soc. 13 (1993) 51] theory of person-centered care and the interpersonal process of caregiving, this article offers an alternative to the image of the family caregiver as victim through an exploration of the lived experience of caring for a person with dementia in community. Extending care beyond coping, the act of giving care is promoted as a worthy activity and reciprocal social opportunity. Three nonfamily caregiver “portraits” are offered in an arts-informed representational form. The relational processes of caregiving are explored from the vantage point of personal experience and theoretical knowledge. Dignity emerges as the resonant quality, essential value, and guiding principle in an ethic of dementia care. Implications about the direction of research about care and caregiving and research accessibility and usefulness are explored.     

The dryland research project at indore (1974–80) — an institutional innovation in rural technology transfer

The problem of how scientific and technical knowledge may best be brought to bear on raising the living standards of the rural poor in developing countries, has become a major world issue. The traditional view is that scientists in research stations establish ‘principles’ which are subsequently articulated in a productive context through a dialogue between extension agents and farmers. This paper explores an alternative model of technology transfer as exemplified by the Indore Dryland Research Project. Here scientists from different disciplines worked directly with farmers in a concerted effort to raise yields per hectare on a catchment area of around 2300 hectares, thus playing a much more direct role themselves while giving extension agencies more of a service function. The paper explores some of the lessons of the Indore experiment, concluding that this type of technology transfer model should be given more prominence in agricultural development planning in poor countries.     

Project Discovery: Social Work Research @ Southern Health

Abstract

The health sector uses a “person-in-environment” perspective reflected in multidisciplinary teamwork to understand and influence human lives. This standpoint accords closely with social work's knowledge and theory base, recognising that material, economic, political, organisational, and social structures interact, creating a complex array of factors impacting on individuals and families. Practice research activities are an effective way of exploring social work's particular contribution to health service provision. We describe and critique various models of practice research reported in the literature. A unique model of practice research that we are developing is discussed. Called Project Discovery: Social Work Research @ Southern Health 18 June 2011, this model demonstrates ways in which practice research may exemplify theoretically-driven and service-based research and in so doing advance social work's knowledgebase.     

View_net: A new tool for network analysis

Evidence from a variety of sources suggests that visual representations can facilitate the analysis of complex relational data, stimulate theoretical insights, and help to convey the results of research to relevant audiences. Advances in computer graphics technology in the last decade have made it possible to create and manipulate complex visual images in real time and these advances provide the basis for developing new tools for network analysis. This paper describes the present state of the art of interactive computer graphics, and a graphics package for interactive visually-assisted network analysis — VIEW_NET — is discussed and illustrated.     

Iconicity,diagrammatics, and aesthetic preferences

I begin with a semiotic view on the evolution of the significatieon process, in order to initiate a discussion about the notion of iconicity as related to the notion of likeness. I then compare the paradigm of iconic representation to the paradigm of diagrammatic representation in the context of aesthetic preferences to analyze the structure of diagrammatic model as related to perception and the modes of learning. I refer to the results of the research on children's drawings from other cultures to support the discussion about the relationship between exposure, familiarity with a given representational convention, and the aesthetic expectations. Since familiarity with visual conventions plays a vital role in shifting boundaries of visual literacy, I argue that information design professionals are responsible for shifting the boundaries of visual literacy.     

À la recherche d’une politique biomédicale en France : chronique d’une réforme inaboutie en cancérologie

This article proposes to explore research administration practices in the analysis of the spread of biomedicine in France. This approach, combined with an analytical positioning inspired by the sociology of organisations, brings an additional element to conventional approaches to biomedicine, since it helps to identify constraints other than those associated with the scientific and clinical practices themselves. Drawing on empirical observation of the development of contemporary policy on cancer research, we will show the crucial influence of the distribution of power between the different stakeholders involved in developing public processes for promoting biomedical practices.     

Moving People and Knowledge: Scientific Mobility in the European Union1

This paper considers the relationship between highly skilled scientific migration (HSM) and the transfer of knowledge within the European Union (EU). To understand these processes we need to conceptualize the phenomenon and then develop appropriate operational tools. HSM engages two key concepts: (1) the concept of skill or knowledge; and (2) the concept of migration. nalysing the impact of HSM requires an understanding of who is moving (and the quality of their skills) and the nature of their migration. This might include consideration of the direction of flows; their frequency, duration, and permanency; and the propensity to return. In order to evaluate the impact of these processes on the regions concerned and develop appropriate policy responses, we need to examine the relationship between scientific mobility and the transfer of knowledge. Much existing literature focuses on the size and direction of migratory flows assuming a clear correlation between human mobility and the transfer of knowledge to identify the “winning” and “losing” regions. More recent work emphasizing “circulation”. questions these assumptions and suggests that flows may not be unidirectional, homogenous, or permanent and may be mitigated by certain “compensatory” mechanisms This article considers some of the issues raised in the literature and the ways in which the variables identified may interact to shape these relationships with important implications for sending and receiving countries and individual scientists. This article does not endeavour to present new conclusions. Drawing on a pilot project concerned with the mobility of Italian scientists, it begins to map out a research agenda capable of informing a new study of scientific migration in the context of EU enlargement that may potentially inform other research in this field.     

Questions of process in participant-generated visual methodologies

There is an increasing literature on visual methodologies in which images are generated by participants as part of the research, as distinct from the analysis of existing images or images taken by the researcher. Although there are growing numbers of publications that present frameworks for analysing images and their meaning, this is an area requiring further deliberation and consolidation. Our contribution is to give serious attention to the processes of image production in participant-generated visual methodologies. We examine methodological and ethical considerations that arise before, during and after image production. Our work is in health research and we focus specifically on two methods: first, a combination of photovoice and photo-elicitation, in particular with young people; and second, drawings as research method. Based on examples using these two methods, we pose questions of process for image production and submit this for interrogation for reasons of methodological, analytical and ethical rigour.