Doing Arts-based Decolonising Research

Object elicitation: A compassionate and culturally informed method for psychotherapy research

“…Part of this respect is deeply valuing the participant's actualising potential (Rogers, 1957a(Rogers, , 1957b; given their present circumstances of displacement, discrimination and poverty because of the asylum process, their vision may seem impossible. & Wicaksono, 2023;Proctor, 2021). It also evidences the repositioning of power in the research alliance to the participant, seeing the researcher as the learner, dwelling alongside the participant through their narrative journey (Plumb, 2008) and positioning the participant as the expert of their own experiences (Rogers, 1961).…”

“…This study explores the employment of object elicitation as a culturally informed and compassionate method, taking the positionality of power‐with, and not power‐over, participants (Proctor, 2021). Charura and Wicaksono (2023) argue for a decolonised approach to research, which aims to demonstrate a deep respect for and valuing of participation and participants. Expanding on what the approach of power‐with, rather than power‐over, means, they suggest that power‐over is synonymous with colonising dynamics whereby researchers focus on having their research questions answered, rather than on engaging with the diversity of world views and experiences that participants bring to the research process.…”

“…Lastly, decolonising research and practice is about challenging and critiquing how Eurocentric ideas and methodologies are given pre‐eminence in ways of researching mental health and ill health, even when they do not fit other groups (Charura & Lago, 2021). In response to this, we decided to use object elicitation as a decolonised approach because it positions the researcher as the learner (Plumb, 2008) and, at the same time, positions both the participant and the researcher as having power with one another, rather than the researcher having power over the participant (Charura & Wicaksono, 2023).…”

“…We will then explicate how our conceptualisations constitute a compassionate research method. In alignment with Charura and Wicaksono (2023), we draw on the work of the quantum physicist Karen Barad (2007), who asks us to consider how what we know about things makes them into what they are ; and how these objects of knowledge are also agents in the generation of knowledge. Barad (2007) challenges us to use a diffractive methodological approach to bring together perspectives and disciplines, which seem far apart, into mutual conversation, reorienting our ontology to give matter a new and participatory status and rethinking how we can utilise our own human relations between matter and its representations, which are inherently intertwined.…”

“…In this study, we position the researcher as the learner, with the participant evoking the senses in our path to knowing which are long forgotten, embodied and tacit, making them available to conscious awareness through the symbolic, and use of externalisation (Eisner, 2008;Jensen, 2022). In line with this, we also draw on the work of Charura and Wicaksono (2023) who recommend an increased awareness of the researcher's and participant's multiple and changing understanding of 'things', both material and conceptual, whilst at the same time remaining committed to the process of searching for their own truths and to the maintenance of ethical research and professional practice. This research aims to support the current movement within psychology and psychotherapy to align with cultural discourse and practices, to democratise the production of knowledge and to decolonise research, making it more relevant and inclusive (Charura & Lago, 2021), using qualitative methods that encourage emic or insider perspectives and diverse voices to construct their own meaning independently from the researcher (Nastasi et al, 2017).…”