Participatory Photo Mapping and Mixed Methods Qualitative Inquiry to Understand and Document Community

• In Event: Novel Approaches to Operationalizing the Neighborhood Context

Abstract

Introduction:
Participatory research approaches like Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR) offer a unique way to understand neighborhoods because they center youths’ lived experiences and expertise (Ozer, 2017). YPAR encourages research methods that are rooted in youths’ strengths and priorities, building community-informed knowledge that may complement and extend the findings from more traditional research methods. This presentation describes a partnership between researchers and youth residents of a Boston-area public housing development and highlights implications for measuring and understanding neighborhoods.

Youth who grow up in public housing communities face numerous risks that are rooted in systems-level issues such as disinvestment in public housing and racially restrictive housing policies (Falkenburger, Arena, & Wolin, 2018). In light of this large-scale disinvestment, many such communities are undergoing redevelopment into mixed-income communities. Literature outlining how youths experience the redevelopment of their communities, from the perspective of youths themselves, is sparse.

Aims and Methods:
The purpose of this research was to better understand how youth perceive the built and social neighborhood environment and learn about their hopes for neighborhood redevelopment. We recruited 6 youth co-researchers (aged 14-17, self-identified as Cape Verdean, Latina, and Black) residing in the public housing community. We worked with youth co-researchers for four months using a mixed-methods participatory approach including: semi-structured interviews; spatial visualization of neighborhood factors using Geographic Information Systems (GIS); and Participatory Photo Mapping (PPM), a method that involves photography, neighborhood walk-along tours, and mapping to identify neighborhood places of importance. As part of this approach, youth took more than 400 photos which were geolocated and used to create digital maps with the Esri Storymaps app, which allows users to visualize data on digital maps, including words, photos, and satellite imagery. Youth co-researchers worked with the university research team to conduct qualitative data analysis and create Storymaps, posters, and an oral presentation to disseminate their findings.

Results:
Results highlight strengths and stressors in the neighborhood environment. The youth described their wishes to draw on strengths such as deep kinship networks, to address stressors including gun violence and a lack of youth-centered spaces in the community. Maps illustrated the prevalence of spaces that youth identified as having a negative influence, including basketball courts and courtyards that once were positive places for children to congregate and now were marred by violence and drug use. Participatory Photo Mapping, combined with in-depth interviews, allowed the research team to capture aspects of the neighborhood built and social environment that would be difficult to measure using standard survey data and, importantly, lent themselves to dissemination and action in the community. Youth co-researchers presented their findings to a forum of community stakeholders and used the forum to begin a process of working collaboratively with stakeholders involved in the redevelopment of their community to ensure that youths’ needs are at the forefront of redevelopment plans.

Authors

• Samantha Teixeira, Boston College
  Presenting Author

• Dabin Hwang, Boston College
  Non-Presenting Author

• Bryn Spielvogel, University of Utah
  Non-Presenting Author

• Joshua Lown, Boston College
  Non-Presenting Author

• Rebekah Levine Coley, Boston College
  Non-Presenting Author