“I don’t feel any danger because I am in my own community”: a photovoice study on adolescents’ perceived community safety

Purpose A safe environment is critical for adolescents’ well-being. The purpose of this photovoice study is to explore reasons that make adolescents feel safe in their community. Design/methodology/approach This study was conducted in Florida through both online and in-person recruitment. After a training session on the ethical and technical use of cameras and a brief introduction of the photovoice methodology, six adolescents took photos (n = 66) in their community and discussed their photos guided by the revised SHOWeD framework. Abridged transcripts were used to match photos with corresponding discussions. Thematic analysis was conducted by the research team. Findings This study identified four main themes related to adolescents’ safe perceptions, including community protective factors (n = 22 photos) such as safe physical environments and community cohesion; family protective factors (n = 14 photos) including safe home and caring parents; traffic safety (n = 14 photos), such as proper road signs, seat belts for car safety and helmets and locks for bicycle safety; and public safety (n = 8 photos), such as emergency numbers, fire departments and police cars and officers. Research limitations/implications Due to the limited number of participants, this study did not compare the similarities and differences of safety perceptions between adolescents living in high crime areas (urban communities) and those in low crime areas (suburban and rural communities). Future photovoice studies are recommended to further explore the influential factors associated with adolescents’ perceived community safety in urban and rural areas with different levels of crime rates to provide more evidence on targeted strategies for community safety promotion in each area. Practical implications By exploring the reasons for adolescents’ safe feelings in their community using photovoice, this study provides insights for future intervention programs to promote community safety for children and adolescents from the community, family, traffic and societal perspectives. Social implications This photovoice study not only empowers adolescents to identify community assets related to their safe perceptions but also illustrates valuable insights for researchers and public health professionals for safety promotion. Originality/value This study has used a broad research question to explore the reasons that make adolescents feel safe, providing them the opportunities to express their opinions by photo taking and photo discussions. Moreover, rich information at the community, family and societal levels has been collected as related to factors contributing to adolescents’ safe perceptions, adding to the literature on community safety. In addition, this photovoice study has offered both in-person and online participation. Such combination not only provides adolescents with an opportunity to choose a participation method that works best for them but also adds to the photovoice methodology by extending the data collection from in-person to online.

Uncovering Social Issues Through Photovoice: A Comprehensive Methodology

Photovoice is a form of participatory action research and community-based participatory research and often used in social sciences to understand the needs of others and uncover the challenges and assets that may exist. Photovoice engages participants in the research process by inviting them to share their experiences through photographs and personal narratives. This act of storytelling and group discussion provides emotional connections among the participant cohort. Through the discussion of shared experience, common themes may arise. This column provides and overview of the photovoice methodology and highlights some of the benefits and limitations one might experience when leading photovoice based projects. Photovoice is a powerful tool that can prove useful for design researchers and practitioners alike as they seek to understand the challenges facing others. It is through this understanding that transformation to improve situations can occur.

“The pain is real”: A [modified] photovoice exploration of disability, chronic pain, and chronic illness (in)visibility

This study uses an innovative modification to Photovoice methodology to explore the lived experiences of people who have non-apparent disabilities, chronic pain and/or chronic illness. Responding to limitations to mobility, movement, transportation, capacity, and access, the project provided a series of studio sessions with a professional photographer, in which participants directed the content and quality of photographs documenting their experiences with disability, chronic pain and/or chronic illness. Four themes emerged from the images and writing: unfettered anger, challenging expectations, duality of reality, and resistance/resilience. Social workers can use these findings and arts-based methodology to help build community among marginalized groups.

The New Normal in Urban Pakistan: A Journey of Undergraduate Students Through Photovoice

The COVID-19 global health crisis is an issue of survival for individuals and communities worldwide. With its widespread consequences manifested at every level of the society, concerns about how to adapt to the new normal are rising. This study explores the lived experiences of second-year undergraduate university students located in urban Pakistan amid the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic, in March to May 2020. Drawing on a participatory research approach, students as participants adopted a photovoice methodology to document, share, and analyze their new life realities. The themes that emerged from the data include fear, anxiety, isolation, relationships and hope, among others. Feelings of agency, empathy and a desire for community action were observed in the photo narratives shared by the participants, as they discussed their health, academic, and communication challenges while struggling to conform to the present circumstances.

Meaningful Aging in the Face of Vulnerability: Perspectives From the Humanities and Arts

This symposium interprets GSA’s 2020 leading conference theme, “Why Age Matters”, as touching upon fundamental existential questions about the meaning of old age. Although meanings of aging have always been implicitly present in a variety of disciplinary gerontological studies, scholars from the humanities and arts have traditionally taken the lead in the field to provide thorough reflections and analyses about what makes later life meaningful. In this symposium, we aim to present a selection of perspectives from the humanities and arts that explore how meaningful aging can be realized in circumstances of the increasing vulnerability that inevitably accompanies old age. First, Hanne Laceulle uses a practice-theoretical philosophical framework to argue that the common assumption that vulnerability constitutes a threat to meaningfulness deserves to be nuanced, because meaning can also occur in the process of integrating vulnerability in one’s life. Second, Theresa Allison, Jennie Gubner and Alexander Smith show how vulnerable older adults living with dementia and their caregivers seek meaning in daily life, adapting meaningful activities to circumstances of increasing vulnerability. Third, Kate de Medeiros and Ulla Kriebernegg discuss how a dialogue between facts and fictions, narrative and literary gerontology, can contribute in seeing vulnerability as a form of resistance. Fourth, Margaret Perkinson illustrates the power of visual images as elicitors of reflections on meaning among the older inhabitants of a Guatemalan village. Documenting villagers’ own perspectives through PhotoVoice methodology underscores the fundamental importance of taking first-person perspectives into account when studying meaning.

Photovoice as a creative coping tool with the COVID-19 crisis in practical training seminar for social work students

The Coronavirus-19 crisis has led university professors, social workers, students and social service consumers to shift to online methods of communication and teaching. In this novel, shared reality, the present paper introduces a new initiative based on implemented photovoice methodology as a tool for documenting BSW students' professional daily lives. This tool was used at a practical training seminar for 16 third year students at the School of Social Work, Sapir Academic College.