Understanding Children’s Experiences of Care in Their School Lives Through Participatory Research Methods: A Comparative Analysis of Focus Group Discussions and Photovoice

Abstract

The theoretical development of the ‘new sociology of childhood,’ coinciding with the recognition of children’s right to express their voice and have it heard on matters affecting them, has inspired the proliferation of participatory methods in research with and by children. This paper addresses a gap in the methodological literature by comparing two such participatory methods, focus group discussions and photovoice, in an exploration of care in children’s school lives. Drawing on the narratives of 49 Second Class children (typically aged eight to nine years) participating in Ireland’s national longitudinal study of primary schooling, Children School Lives (https://www.cslstudy.ie), the paper details the data collection, processing, and analysis associated with each method, as well as the emergent themes arising from each. We draw on our exploration of care in children’s school lives in order to illustrate the comparison of the two participatory methods. Our comparative analysis underscores the greater complexity associated with the data collection, processing, and analysis for photovoice. In addition, emergent themes suggest two distinct discourses on care arising from each method. While narratives from focus group discussions offer descriptive accounts of children’s experiences, photovoice data provide a more personal, emotive, and in-depth account of care in children’s school lives. Methodological decisions taken in this study and implications for future research which employs participatory methods with children are discussed and positioned within the wider literature.