Using Creative Visual Research Methods to Understand Media Audiences

Abstract

This article introduces an emerging area of qualitative media «audience» research, in which individuals are asked to produce media or visual material themselves, as a way of exploring their relationship with particular issues or dimensions of media. The process of making a creative visual artefact – as well as the artefact itself (which may be, for example, a video, drawing, collage, or imagined magazine cover) – offers a reflective entry-point into an exploration of individuals» relationships with media culture. This article sets out some of the origins, rationale and philosophy underlying this methodological approach; briefly discusses two example studies (one in which children made videos to consider their relationship with the environment, and one in which young people drew pictures of celebrities as part of an examination of their aspirations and identifications with stars); and finally considers some emerging issues for further development of this method.