Photo-Elicitation Interview Guide

The individual photo-elicitation interview was the analytical heart of this study. Each participant brought 5–7 photographs they had selected from their two-week photography period, and we spent 60–90 minutes discussing what each image revealed about their experience of belonging, precarity, and institutional contradiction at TRU.

The interview protocol is semi-structured: it provides a set of generative questions and a facilitation logic, but the participant directs the conversation. The photographs are the primary text. My role is to listen carefully enough to follow the participant’s analysis rather than redirect it toward my own.

PHOTO-ELICITATION INTERVIEW PROTOCOL

Duration: 60–90 minutes
Format: Individual, one-on-one with researcher
Location: Participant’s choice of private, comfortable space
Materials: Participant’s selected photographs (5–7 images); interview guide; audio recorder (with consent)

Opening: Healing-Centred Check-In (5–10 minutes)

Before any discussion of photographs or research topics, the interview begins with a genuine check-in drawn from Ginwright’s (2018) healing-centred engagement model:

“Before we start, I want to ask: how are you arriving today? What are you bringing into this room?”

This is a real question, offered with time and attention. Participants are free to share as much or as little as they wish. The check-in serves several functions: it signals that the participant’s full humanity matters in this space, it creates a brief transition from the rest of the day’s demands, and it provides the researcher with important context about the participant’s state of mind before beginning a conversation that may surface difficult material.

Rolling consent confirmation follows: the researcher confirms the participant’s willingness to proceed and reviews the option to skip, pause, or stop at any point.

Photograph Selection Review (5 minutes)

The participant lays out or shares their selected photographs. The researcher asks:

“Can you tell me a little about how you chose these particular images , what made you decide to bring these ones today?”

This opening question serves as an orientation to the participant’s analytical priorities rather than an analytical question in itself. The participant has already made a series of interpretive choices by selecting these images, and this question surfaces those choices before the deeper discussion begins.

Core Photo Discussion (40–60 minutes)

For each photograph, the researcher follows the participant’s lead and uses the questions below as generative prompts rather than a fixed script. The order of questions varies depending on where the participant goes first.

Analytical Level	Generative Questions	Purpose
Observational	“Tell me what you see in this photograph.” / “Walk me through what’s in this image.”	Establishes a shared vocabulary for the photograph; allows the participant to set the descriptive frame before interpretation begins
Interpretive	“What is really happening here, in your view?” / “What does this image mean to you?” / “What were you seeing when you took this photograph?”	Moves from description to analysis; invites the participant to name what the image reveals about their experience
Relational	“How does this connect to your life here?” / “Is this a common experience for you, or something you were seeing for the first time?” / “Do you think other students see this the way you do?”	Connects the specific image to broader patterns of experience; opens the discussion to structural rather than individual analysis
Structural	“Why do you think this situation exists?” / “Who benefits from things being this way?” / “What would have to change for this to look different?”	Invites systemic analysis; shifts from individual experience to institutional structure
Forward-looking	“What would you want someone who runs this university to understand, if they looked at this photograph?” / “What do you wish I could show them?”	Orients the analysis toward advocacy and change; positions the participant as knowledge producer for an institutional audience

Table 1
Photo-Elicitation Interview: Question Framework by Analytical Level

Researcher Reflection (5–10 minutes)

Near the end of the interview, the researcher briefly shares a relevant observation or reflection from her own Scholarly Personal Narrative strand, in keeping with the blended witnessing methodology. This is reciprocal disclosure rather than analysis. The participant then has the opportunity to respond, extend, or redirect.

“I want to share something from my own experience that I think connects to what you’ve been describing. I’d welcome your response to it.”

Closing and Member Checking Preparation (10 minutes)

Participant invited to add anything they want on the record before the recording ends
Explanation of member checking process: participant will receive a transcript for review and correction before analysis begins
Visual sovereignty reminder: any photograph may be withdrawn at any time
Group debrief session logistics confirmed
Check-out: “How are you leaving today? Is there anything you need before you go?”

Design Rationale

Photo-elicitation interviews differ from standard qualitative interviews in a critical respect: the photograph is the primary analytical object, distinct from what the participant says, but the primary analytical object around which the interview is organized (Harper, 2002). This means the researcher’s job is to follow the image rather than the question list. A participant who spends twenty minutes on a single photograph of a cracked ceiling tile and three minutes on a photograph of a student services poster is telling the researcher something important about the relative analytical weight of those two objects in their experience. The protocol is structured to honour that weighting.

The healing-centred opening and closing draws on Ginwright’s (2018) critique of trauma-informed care as a framework that positions participants as damaged rather than as people navigating difficult structural conditions. Healing-centred engagement starts from strength and wholeness rather than wound. In a study where participants are being asked to document institutional failure, beginning and ending with a genuine question about how they are arriving and departing is the minimum standard of ethical relational practice.

The blended witnessing strand that appears near the end of the interview is methodologically significant. It enacts the core claim of the Scholarly Personal Narrative methodology: that the researcher’s experience is data, that transparency about positionality is an analytical contribution, and that the witnessing relationship runs in both directions. This is discussed in full on the Blended Witnessing page.

References

Ginwright, S. (2018). The future of healing: Shifting from trauma informed care to healing centred engagement. Occasional Paper. https://medium.com/@ginwright/the-future-of-healing-shifting-from-trauma-informed-care-to-healing-centered-engagement-634f557ce69c

Harper, D. (2002). Talking about pictures: A case for photo elicitation. Visual Studies, 17(1), 13–26. https://doi.org/10.1080/14725860220137345

Pages

Appendix H: Photo-Elicitation Interview Guide