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Given the high prevalence of labor migration in developing countries and the changing age and labor structure, grandparents are stepping in to take more responsibilities for the children left behind by their parents who migrated to work elsewhere. To involve children’s perspectives and voices on their lives with grandparents in research, we conducted a school-based Photovoice project with 30 children who were mainly taken care by their grandparents in rural China in 2022. This study aims to evaluate the impacts of this Photovoice program on participating children's individual and family wellbeing based on in-depth interviews and pre- and post-test survey data.
Methods:
Thirty left-behind children aged between 10 to 12 were recruited in a rural primary school in Chongqing, a region with dense left-behind families in southwest China. Participants were divided into three Photovoice groups, and each group included five sessions. Children were asked to take photos that can best represent their everyday lives with their custodial grandparents and shared these photos with their peers during guided group sessions.
A two-part mixed‐methods study design was used. Participants were asked to rate their degree of satisfaction with the project by each session. Group reflection in terms of three focus group interviews were also conducted with the participants after the project completion. The four Fs (Facts, Feelings, Findings, and Future) of active reviewing framework was adapted to help participants reflect on their experiences throughout the project. In addition, participants’ individual and family wellbeing were measured using Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression (CESD) and Family Resilience Assessment Scale (FRAS) at the first and the last sessions of the Photovoice project.
Open coding method was used to analyze the transcripts of focus group interviews using Atlas.ti 23.0.1. Due to the small sample size of this study, non-parametric method was used to analyze the pre- and post-test survey data. R programming was used for survey data processing.
Results:
Our qualitative data showed that children who participated in the Photovoice project expressed positive appreciation for Photovoice. They reported increased self-confidence and sociability, improved peer relationships, enhanced self-observation of their own lives, and a greater sense of intimacy with their grandparents. Our Wilcoxon Signed-Rank Test results showed that participants’ CESD scores decreased significantly after the Photovoice project (p = 0.03). However, their family wellbeing measured by FRAS did not change significantly (p = 0.64).
Conclusion and Implication:
Although photovoice is increasingly used as a research method in social work research and related fields, few studies have evaluated the impact of this method on the participants. Our study evidenced that Photovoice is a child-friendly approach that facilitates children in expressing their perspectives and experiences through photo taking and sharing. Underrepresented children can be empowered through photo creation and exhibition. Our findings suggest for greater utilization of Photovoice technique and its multi-method evaluation in future social work research and practice.