Conceptual Care Mapping: The Practice of Care Inside and Outside of the Home

Abstract

In April 2012, I embarked on the primary fieldwork research stage of my 3-year PhD studentship. A key concern of my research was with how lone mothers experience, practise and understand the everyday work of childcare, in both their own parental capacity and through formal modes of care provision. In particular, I was interested in the intersection of the private sphere of the home (where childcare has traditionally taken place) with the public sphere of formal childcare spaces such as nurseries, childminders and preschools. Alongside loosely structured, in-depth, repeat-longitudinal interviews with 11 participants, I also asked them to draw conceptual care maps of their household and local routines to illustrate both the temporal and spatial elements of their everyday care experiences. This case study outlines the development, practice and analysis of conceptual care maps as a qualitative social science methodology, highlighting its strengths as well as ways in which students could alter or reformulate the method to fit their research questions. It is hoped that this case study will encourage the development of conceptual care maps both within and beyond the social sciences and contribute to a growing pool of creative qualitative methodologies.

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