Using In-Home Video to Study Parenting Practices: A Pilot Study

• In Event: New Approaches to Studying Cultural Capital

Abstract

Perspective
Researchers have relied on surveys, interviews and in-person observations to understand how families develop cultural capital in their children. Survey and interview data can be more easily collected, but they suffer from social desirability bias (e.g., Hofferth, 2006) and depend on parents accurately recalling events. Observations provide richer data parent cultural capital transmission, but few social scientists have been able to “get in” to families’ private and intimate spaces. The use of cameras as an observational tool, however, is becoming more common, feasible, and accepted. In this paper, we outline the benefits of in-home video ethnography for its ability to capture the complexity of action as it unfolds; uncover events and behaviors that investigators might not have thought to ask about in surveys or interviews; and provide a record that can be analyzed by multiple researchers with diverse perspectives.

Data/Method
We recruited a small but diverse sample of 12‐14 families in the Princeton‐Trenton (New Jersey) area that agreed to have two weeks of their daily lives and routines video recorded. Continuously activated video cameras (recording day and night) placed strategically in up to four rooms in participants’ homes constitute the primary means of data collection.

For this paper, we examine researchers’ notes and minutes from research team meetings (between 2012 and 2017) as the New Jersey Families Study was designed and implemented. We focus on the process of generating survey/interview protocols, which involved reviewing existing surveys of parenting, as well as the logistics of launching an in-home video study. Second, we analyze the responses of families to interview questions before and after they were video recorded in their homes regarding their participation in the study.

Results
By using survey questions from existing surveys, we were confident about their reliability and validity. We found that some survey questions imposed restrictions on parents’ responses by, for instance, assuming that families had only one childcare arrangement for their children or that parents had one (primary) employer. In pre-testing the surveys, we also found it difficult to build rapport with participants – the survey left us little or no room to engage with their responses by asking follow-up questions.

Launching the in-home video study posed a number of challenges in terms of funding, the IRB process, and ethical concerns. Contrary to our expectations, however, we found that participating families expressed few reservations, either before or after the videotaping, about being recorded for the study.

Significance
Families play a critical role in building their children’s early skills and knowledge (Duncan et al., 2007). To increase the proportion of children who enter school ready to learn requires a deeper focus on the home environment. Our paper proposes new tools to better measure how parenting shapes children’s early development.

Duncan, Greg J. et al. 2007. “School Readiness and Later Achievement.” Developmental Psychology 43(6):1428-1446.

Hofferth, S. 2006. “Response Bias in a Popular Indicator of Reading to Children.” Sociological Methodology 36: 301-315.

Authors

• Joanne Golann, Vanderbilt University - Peabody College

• Zitsi Mirakhur, The Research Alliance for New York City Schools