Drawing Out Their Stories: A Scoping Review of Participatory Visual Research Methods With Newcomer Children

Abstract

Researchers are increasingly using participatory visual methods (PVM) to gain a deeper understanding of newcomer children’s experiences, sense of identity, relationships, needs, strengths, and aspirations. By taking photos, producing digital stories, creating maps, drawing, sculpting, and other visual-based practices, children can help us understand how they navigate their complex worlds. We conducted a scoping review to explore what is known about participatory visual research with newcomer children. We searched nine databases, screened 692 articles, and included 21 articles for synthesis and analysis. Five common and connected areas were identified as important for consideration when envisioning, planning, and conducting this type of research with newcomer children: PVM provides an opportunity for children to communicate complex feelings and disrupt deficit discourse; participation in PVM research is highly dependent on varying cultural, economic, and relational factors; providing a range and choice of data collection activities permits deeper engagement and higher quality data; PVM can enhance meaningful engagement, reduce power asymmetry, and engender confidence and self-awareness; developing and sustaining trusted relationships are integral to the research process. The review reveals the need for more researcher reflexivity with an explicit attention to assumptions, values, and ethical considerations and suggests opportunities for researchers to better ensure newcomer children can share and shape their own stories.

Promoting Voice and Agency Among Forcibly Displaced Children and Adolescents: Participatory Approaches to Practice in Conflict-Affected Settings

“…Combinations of narrative and diverse media have proven useful in eliciting the views of children and adolescents (Brown et al 2020). Visual-narrative methods such as photovoice (Lykes and Scheib 2015;Suffla, Seedat and Bawa 2015;Wang and Burris 1997) enable children and adolescents to photograph the important things in their lives and to narrate around them as they choose.…”

Newcomer families' experiences with programs and services to support early childhood development in Canada: A scoping review

“…Our use of the Arksey and O'Malley (2005) scoping review framework is a strength, as is our discussion of the results using the RAISED Between Cultures model. As well, this work is being conducted by a team with diverse expertise in a variety of fields relevant to this work, and experience in conducting evidence synthesis, including scoping reviews (Brown, Spencer, McIsaac & Howard, 2020;McIsaac, Spencer, Chiasson, Kontak & Kirk, 2019;Spencer, Rehman & Kirk 2015). A typical restriction of scoping reviews is that they do not include quality assessment; we can therefore not speak to the quality of articles included in this study.…”

Game-based Learning and Co-Design with and for Newcomer Children’s Social Adjustment

“…Several attempts have been made to help newcomers and their children through various initiatives; examples of these efforts include working with refugee students in classrooms (Roxas, 2011), (Mozynah Nofa, 2017); applying participatory visual research methods with newcomer children (Brown, Spencer, McIsaac & Howard, 2020); conducting workshops in school (Rousseau, Lacroix, Singh, Gauthier & Benoit, 2005); and exploring potential roles for technologies to alleviate some of the challenges faced by child refugees (Hourcade et al, 2019).…”

“…A recent scoping review of participatory visual research (PVM) methods with newcomer children (Brown et al, 2020) Also, the analysis showed the need for more researcher reflexivity with specific attention to hypotheses, values and ethical considerations, and recommends opportunities for scholars to guarantee newcomer children can reveal and shape their own stories.…”

“…experiences. For example,Brown et al (2020) conducted a scoping review to explore what is known about participatory visual research (PVM) with newcomer children. The review searched nine databases, screened 692 articles, and included 21 articles for synthesis and analysis.…”