On Creating My Method of Research in Creators’ Biographies – a Researcher’s Reflection

Abstract

The main objective of this paper is to present the process of preparing and conducting my biographical research regarding creators’ middle-adulthood. My intention in this study is to direct attention towards such an approach to creators’ biographies that in the very process of biographical narrative reconstruction reveals not only the different viewpoints regarding life experiences, but also interpretation of events. First of all, my approach to biographical research did not focus on creators’ life stories, but allowed them to create different tales of their own lives and to show different aspects of their autobiographical experiences related to shaping their own lives. In this paper, I intend to discuss a methodological solution and by this, to show how my research methods developed during the preparation stage, but also during the stages of implementation and preparation of the concept of analysis. A particular challenge, which is the subject of this study, was the strategy that required some aspects of creativity in the process of data collecting. Within the frame of this strategy, the researcher prepared biographical tasks designed in consideration of the poosed research problems. The tasks took a form of diverse forms of activity (verbal, visual) and encouraged respondents to refer to their own life experiences (past), reflect on the present moment (present), consider plans and projects (future), as well as to inspire constructing different stories about life (Lasocińska, 2013; 2017). The result of that was a structure that divided a biographical interview into phases and stages that assume different uses of time periods and diverse biographical reflections. In the following text, I do not focus on the results of my research, which are still being formulated, but focus my attention on concepts and research experiences related to the search for adequate solutions for the chosen topic and to the initial assumptions of the research.