Penta Portas and the Multi-disciplinary Arts-based Method Framework (MAMF): An Empirical and Theoretical Investigation of Arts-based Methods

Abstract

Research interest in arts-based methods is evidenced by a large number of journals, books and handbooks/collections that received increased attention and/or were introduced, for example the journals ’Visual Arts Research’, ’Visual Studies’ and ’The Graphic Medicine Review’, publications on visual arts-based methods in established journals like the ’International Journal of Qualitative Methods’, ’Qualitative Inquiry’, ’Qualitative Research’ and the ’British Journal of Educational Studies’. However, in HCI and Computer Science such research methods are underrepresented.

This PhD investigates ’drawing and writing’ as an arts-based method to gain an understanding of it as a participatory qualitative research method as well as of arts-based methods themselves to extend qualitative inquiry in HCI. The research employs inductive empirical work and deductive reflection. Two exploratory qualitative studies explore Penta Portas, drawing and writing for experience reflection, followed by a ’deductive turn’, resulting in the development of MAMF, a multi-disciplinary framework for arts-based methods and a discussion of drawing and writing as processes and products in arts participation.

The studies highlight the importance of instruction wording and openness to the appropriation of/free choice of arts-based expression forms. They also highlight that, for adults, free reflection is perceived as ’easy brainstorming’ and reflection via Penta Portas as pre-structuring ’sensory exploration’ but that both support experience reflection well. The same holds true for drawing and writing, with different people prescribing different rationales for both. The second study also highlights that further work is needed to disentangle the interplay between experience reflection via Penta Portas/Empty Sheet and subsequent drawing and writing (’iterative reflection’) as well as between the intertwined qualities of these processes. Further contributions of this PhD are the development of Penta Portas, an experience reflection tool and method supporting drawing and writing in their own right, and a Multi-disciplinary Arts-based Methods Framework (MAMF), based on a multi-disciplinary literature review, which aims to support research design as well as systematic data/artefact analysis in artsbased methods research.

Date of Award	24 Apr 2024
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	University of Bath
Supervisor	Alan Hayes (Supervisor)