Whilst the significance and context of the claims are described in words, a full understanding can only be obtained with direct reference to the outcomes.
Such research includes practice as an integral part of its method and often falls within the general area of action research.
that practice-based research aims to generate culturally novel apprehensions that are not just novel to the creator or individual observers of an artefact; and it is this that distinguishes the researcher from the practitioner (Scrivener, 2002).
A practice-based PhD is distinguishable from a conventional PhD because creative outcomes from the research process may be included in the submission for examination and the claim for an original contribution to the field are held to be demonstrated through the original creative work.
Mine is 60-80 plus a practical/technological component in an appropriate form
You need to do more writing
What’s my distinct contribution to knowledge?
Knowledge
I’m up to here
Research methods to better understand:
- Action research
- Data collection frameworks (Bilda, Z., Costello, B. & Amitani, S. (2006) Collaborative Analysis Framework for Evaluating Interactive Art Experience, Co-Design Special issue.)
- Discourse analysis
- Conversation analysis
- Survey
- Interview
- Video data analysis
Methods centred on making
- Reflective practice / reflection-in and on-action (Schön) — structured reflection at defined points in the making process, not just diary-keeping. The rigour comes from the structure: fixed intervals, consistent prompts, dated records.
- https://libguides.hull.ac.uk/reflectivewriting/schon
- Studio/practice journals and process logs — the primary data source for most projects. Version-controlled repos, commit histories, screen recordings and build notes all count and are more credible than retrospective narrative.
- Process logs from the repo, can I build that into my record keeping more?
- Iterative cycles / action research — plan, make, observe, reflect, revise. Maps cleanly onto software iteration, which is why it’s the default for digital work.
- Research through design / prototyping — building successive artefacts where each prototype tests a proposition. Distinguish exploratory prototypes from ones designed to answer a specific question; examiners look for that.
- Material thinking / thinking-through-making (Bolt, Carter) — the argument that handling the medium generates knowledge unavailable by other means. In digital work this means the specific affordances and resistances of your toolchain.
- Autoethnography — first-person account situated in a cultural context. Useful, but needs a clear analytic frame or it reads as memoir.
- Speculative and critical design / design fiction — artefacts as arguments about possible futures rather than solutions.
- A/r/tography — artist/researcher/teacher identities held together; strongest if teaching is part of your practice.
Methods for gathering data around the work
- Audience and participant studies — observation, think-aloud protocols, interaction logging, video analysis of engagement, exit interviews. Standard for interactive installation work, and the thing most often done too thinly.
- Semi-structured interviews — with other practitioners, curators, technicians, participants.
- Elicitation methods — showing participants the artefact, footage or their own interaction data to prompt reflection.
- Case study — of other artists’ works, of your own project, or comparative.
- Practitioner-expert critique / peer review sessions — documented crits treated as data rather than as informal feedback.
- Exhibition as method — the show as a designed research event with defined conditions, not just dissemination.
Analytic methods
- Thematic analysis and grounded theory coding — for interview and reflection data.
- Interaction analysis of video and logs — micro-level examination of what people actually did.
- Contextual review — the art-and-design equivalent of a literature review, covering works, exhibitions and artefacts alongside texts.
- Practice mapping / visual methods — diagrams, matrices and taxonomies as analytic instruments, not illustrations. Gray & Malins is strong on this.
- Media archaeology / software studies readings — analysing the technical substrate as culturally loaded.
Framing and documentation methods
- Documentation as method (Mäkelä, Nimkulrat) — deciding what to capture, when and in what form, as a deliberate methodological choice. For time-based and software work this is load-bearing.
- Triangulation across modes — Nelson’s point that practice, documentation and writing each evidence different things, and the claim rests on their convergence.
- Portfolio or exposition structure — the Research Catalogue’s exposition format as a way of presenting multi-media evidence.