Reflections: Stream A

Lousie Ryan and Jon Mullholand’s paper (presented by Jon) was the first that I attended and it was a fantastic way to start the day. It set the tone for how interesting and enjoyable the conference was going to be and taught me about using emailing as a research method, something I had not thought about before. When I heard about the conference, I initially thought of the advantages of using innovative methods but what I found most interesting about Jon’s session was the extra consideration needed in his and Louise’s research when trying to communicate over email without visual cues. When emailing participants’ questions and analysing their responses, Jon discussed how it took him a long time to craft his replies so that participants felt heard. When I gathered data through interviews for my dissertation, I could nod and smile to show interest but it was useful to think about how researching through email communication meant that Jon and Louise would not be able to do this. One of the delegates said that the session had helped them to think about the practical and ethical considerations needed for their own virtual research. 

Yessica Abigail Tronco Hernandez discussed how she had to adapt her plan to use the Nominal Group Technique (NGT) when COVID-19 meant her research needed to be conducted virtually. The session was useful as it taught me what NGT was and how it can be a useful method for gathering data. It was really interesting to hear how COVID-19 can impact a researcher’s choice of method and made me think about how this will impact the data they obtain. Both Jon and Abigail covered digital literacy during their talks as Jon discussed how digital literacy may impact people’s ability to participate in research conducted virtually. I thought it was great that he discussed how we should not generalise and make assumptions that all young people are digitally confident just because the young are associated with using social media. Abigail pointed out that access to an electronic device and to a stable connection are not available to everyone. This prompted discussion of how this limits representativity of findings if data only represents those who have access to technology. These sessions made me realise some of the considerations made by researchers conducting virtual research, which I found fascinating. 

When Abigail discussed problems with using Miro and the whiteboard on Zoom for discussions as part of her research, I was able to ask her how she decided to adapt her method to use the Zoom chat instead. The conference was an amazing opportunity to ask questions like this and get real-time answers. The interactive element of the conference was a really useful part of Ruthe Castro de Aquino Pinheiro’s paper too when she discussed how it felt to use autoethnography. Ruthe spoke about how she had found it strange using the first-person for the first time. The discussions after each talk were a great way to help delegates to feel engaged and as though we were part of something. Julie Parsons, the chair of this session, referred to Liz Stanley’s work on auto/biography in 1993 and other delegates recommended or discussed work on autoethnography and first-person research that they had read themselves. This session highlighted for me that the conference was going to be a supportive, engaging space for people to share their ideas and discuss research issues and concerns. 

Stream A: Afternoon Session

Papers in this session: 

‘Research during Covid-19: Ethical Conundrums’ by Suparna Bagchi. 

‘Re-imagining writing: writing with covid’ by Mary Catherine Garland. 

“It set the tone for how interesting and enjoyable the conference was going to be”

“This session highlighted for me that the conference was going to be a supportive, engaging space for people to share their ideas and discuss research issues and concerns”

Suparna Bahchi and Mary Garland’s presentations were interesting in showing two very different accounts of how COVID-19 has impacted social research. Suparna discussed how the pandemic had limited her research to Plymouth, preventing her from being able to research the perspectives of participants from other cities. This was particularly pertinent I think as this must apply to a lot of research conducted recently. In the morning Stream A session, Jon Mullholand spoke about how virtual research can transcend geographical boundaries, which was advantageous for my own undergraduate dissertation in which I studied how professional women perceive ambition and the notion that they must ‘Think Male’ to succeed in their careers. Before Suparna’s talk, I associated research during the pandemic as spanning a greater distance but her comments made me think about how it can limit accessibility of participants face-to-face, as researchers may be unable to travel. As the pandemic is still ongoing, I wondered about how long COVID-19 is going to influence social research in this way and how it may prevent some narratives from being collected.  

In her research Suparna aimed to explore perspectives and experiences of practitioners, students and parents towards multiculturalism in primary schools. Although I have read about the practical and ethical considerations when studying minors, the conference was the first time I had heard about it from someone who has done it themselves. An element of Suparna’s discussion that stood out to me was when she explained that she was asked to sit with her mask on at a social distance from the students. This made me think about how I took being able to smile at my dissertation interviewees for granted, as masks could prevent such facial expressions from being visible. It was brilliant to be able to ask Suparna more about this, as I was intrigued at how wearing a mask affected the relationships she was able to build. I was impressed to hear that students were talkative and that on the last day of data collection, they waved to her when she entered the school. She reflected that this was very ‘heartening’ as she had only been there for a few days and I felt this was eye-opening in illustrating how rapport can be built successfully despite distancing measures.

Although Mary Garland did not set out to use any nonconventional methodologies, she discussed, in her paper, how she used writing as a method and diverged from conventions of academic writing. After her presentation, a conversation between Mary and the chair, Juliet Hall, focused on how Mary was trying to work within academic, structural boundaries whilst simultaneously working outside of them using an innovative approach. She wanted to use a unique method, while also trying to work within word count and time frame constraints. This taught me something new as it suggested there is a balance between being innovative and meeting academic expectations. Mary also explored how the pandemic has impacted on her writing. It was powerful when she reflected on receiving a message from the NHS that stated she was at high risk of severe illness if she caught COVID-19. She said, ‘And that’s it, no more words appearing on the laptop screen […] it’s as though they’ve been ruptured, replaced by a thudding, racing heart’. This was compelling as I imagined how Mary might have felt and thought about how anxieties due to the pandemic can impact people’s ability to write or complete their other daily tasks. 

“It made me think about how it can limit accessibility of participants face-to-face, as researchers may be unable to travel”

“Mary was trying to work within academic, structural boundaries whilst simultaneously working outside of them using an innovative approach”