Full Circle Associates

Using Photographic Data to Build a Large-Scale Global Comparative Visual Ethnography of Domestic Spaces: Can a limited data set capture the complexities of “sociality:
Simon Pulman-Jones, GfK Group

This paper looks at the implications of a research approach that might appear to be anti-ethnographic. Use sociality as a lens to look at this approach. A database of photos taking in 20 households in 12 countries, developed to be part of a suite of quantitative research trends offered by GfK. VSDS.

Sociality: the net we cast
We are a broad community, drawing on a wide range of practices and beliefs. Not only do we not necc. Share theoretical points of reference. Politically where we are situated – we’ve embraced the fact that we can know stuff about the world without having to find a place for that knowledge within academic discourse. Half an eye on fellow kin, half on academics, from those from other intellectual positions or none. Free of the doubly snared …

Out in the world our role is to convince those for whom and with whom we work that the world is more complex than they might assume and their work might benefit from the special work we do. Drawing on our theoretical roots for our nets. A sense of what our view of the world is all about, its sociality.

For the past several years, I a dry British sociologists, have used quotes from “Interpretations of Cultures” to convey what we bring to our clients. (Clifford Geertz quote – see proceedings). “Believing, with Max Weber, that man is an animal suspended in webs of significances he himself has spun, I take culture to be those webs and the analysis of it to be therefore not an experimental science in search of law but an interpretive one in search of meaning.” One way we relate to theory in the biz world. Using bits and pieces provisionally. We offer gifts of theory to each other, rather than theory as something suspended above practice. The practical reality in how we share theories loosely with each other in our work and which gives us room to maneuver. How we position ourselves rather than advancing discourses. Show what we know rather than test the robustness of that knowledge.

This method of visual data collection for global consumer trends market research. Visual Survey of Domestic Spaces (VSDS) part of a market consumer research products sold as a subscription service, 30,000 consumers in 12 countries. Structured for comparability across countries or consumers. Multi client ongoing study. 240 households, 18,000 photos in a relational database.

Mapping global consumer “value” profile
Mapped to consumer trends through value profiles established through asking people to prioritize 60+ value statements, how they associate those with … Mapped to this map (visual), which contrasts people with power and fun with tradition. Allows global product and services managers a high level scan of their terrains. Value segments. Year on year value segments are trended. Recent increase in strivers in the emerging economies of China and India. Altruists and creatives have trended down.

Collapsing sociality into individuals with the complexities of local sociality rendered into the value profiles. (Interesting visual representation).

Ethnographic component was conceived as a complement to the quantitative study back into the particularity of local contexts. A visual data set could be a double-edged sword. Instead of revealing complexity of sociality. The individual might vanish. Prescriptive individualism displaces the individuality of the person. On the face of this, it seems apt description of the photographic study. Define individuals by an inventory of their choices. What are the benefits and pitfalls?

VSDS covers 9 functional areas. The original impetus came from a client problem of understanding style preference. Certain section of its customer like the company, the brand, the stores, but did not buy anything as nothing was of their “style.” Problem to address. This company did a lot of its strategic decision making through GfKs quantitative research tools, our initial thought that we should do some ethnographic research for them was linked up to the Roper reports worldwide. Need to do the research in many countries. To do a conventional study would have been prohibitively expensive. So chose lowest common denominator of the visual style. Then we looked at the practical problems of what to photograph – the functional areas of homes. Images coded for objects, functions and other attributes then navigable in the database.

The range of perceived benefits of this addition were instructive. Provided the ability to illustrate the quantitative trend analysis. Home as haven. Photos available to demonstrate by country or consumer profile lending rhetorical weight to the quantitative data. Not what the ethnographers intended – the ability to explore new analytic possibilities and for subverting conventional assumptions. Fetishist attraction to working with relational database for the sociologists.

“the photograph in anthropology is as much a means of discovering information as it is of presenting that which has been found… a locus for dialoging rather than as a source of information in itself. The value of the image in ethnographic fieldwork is here precisely in its indeterminacy insofar as that allows processes of interpretation.. to go on around it (Glenn Bowman)

Household types – segmentation model looking at variations of how interiors are disposed. Based on household time. Families with children, empty nesters, etc. When we interrogated the segmentation model against our data, a household that ought to be different, we saw the main variations in the data set had more to do with socio economic status, cultural factors, and country. Household composition was not a strong differentiating factor apart from the evidence of children. Made clear – had we been able to talk with members of households about the arrangement of their homes, we might have found that how households are arrangements … recognition of fundamental aspects of sociality and material culture that might not have been seen in the personal narratives of participants. (missed stuff.) Narratives may overlook the physical characteristics.

It can assist in pulling individuals out of their context to look at a global set of trends. Rather than reduce things to possessions, or force attribution of material contents as consumer inventory. Does not provide a holistic view, but there may be value to that. Recognize the limitation of any one data collection method. Be freed of tyranny of ethnographic datasets. Beyond mere reportage. Data sets in rapid commercial ethnographies are rarely as holistic as we wish them to be.

It was interesting to notice how the data was received. We did a rapid foray through the data to pull out stories to talk about clients and interest them in this new product. (Tells a story about a complex in St. Petersburg with a food and beverage client. Looking at communal spaces, neglected and unused, and showing up in personal spaces.) Story was easy to put together from data. The quantitative people would not use them with clients. The ethnographers were called in to tell the stories. Simple and compelling, but not adopted by the team. In combination for constructive of narrative become complex puzzle which show the value of the contribution of the ethnographer. Gell quote about art and magical. Custodians of sociality enshrined in the data.


Categories: EPIC2005, photographic_databases