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Introduction In the following self-reflexive (examining my own experiences) piece I discuss the methodology of my PhD thesis which, completed in 2014 (Johnson On a Tightrope), focused on how women negotiate, reject and embody the expectations associated with contemporary pregnancy and mothering. In this qualitative research project I examined the types of pregnancy and parenting practices (defined as those practices undertaken to manage and maximise the success of women’s pregnancies and parenting) women engage in with reference to contemporary sources of information. Central to this, I studied the changing nature of pregnancy and mothering practices in the context of increasing digitalisation, with a particular focus on whether and how technologies enable new spaces for experiential learning and health responsibilisation. This also allowed me to query how various discourses work to inform particular ideas of ‘good’ or ‘appropriate’ mothering behaviours and mothering ideologies, and the expert patient ideal (Johnson Maternal Devices). An examination of the different resources and technologies women draw on during their transition to first-time motherhood reveals how dominant discourses are resisted, negotiated or differentially embodied by women facing first-time pregnancy and motherhood. Since the time I began my research, there has been an explosion of applications (apps) into the market. Pregnancy and mothering have been ‘appified’. Apps offer a unique way to order, engage with and reshape our bodies and biology today. They reflect wider cultural and social changes in the understanding of our identity, our ‘lifestyle’ and our body. In my study I drew on characterisations from participants in attempting to understand the affordances of apps and the role they may play during both pregnancy and new motherhood. I found that apps format motherhood and pregnancy in new ways, instituting new rules into new devices and offering templates which actively shape meanings and practices. They provide new ways to imagine or create foetal/child identity, to monitor child activity from a distance, to gather and interpret data and the enactment of “digital” helicopter parenting (Johnson Maternal Devices). Apps also represent a ‘tidbitisation’ of information which is delivered directly into the user’s intimate sphere, sometimes ‘pushed’ into this intimate sphere, no matter where they are. This ‘device-ification’ of mothering purports to turn it into an administrative and calculable activity, valuing data over subjective experiences and changing the meaning of what it is to mother and be a mother. Apps also represent the contemporary intersection between social media, medical advice, expectations of self-management and notions of convenience. They also creates new social relations and valuing practices, such as ‘likeability’ on Facebook, which have the potential to alter our understandings of health and identity. Increasing numbers of health initiatives are adopting apps in their promotional marketing campaigns and the appification of health means that medical knowledge is being increasingly incorporated into new sorts of social interactions. Ongoing research must consider the multiplicity of women’s engagement with these apps across the transition to first-time motherhood and for parents who are trying to manage child health. It would be productive to direct focus onto the lived experiences associated with apps rather than lauding or criticising the content of apps. Background The initial question that motivated my research was: ‘How do women draw on, weave together, and reject aspects of the dominant advice which configures contemporary perceptions of maternal subjectivity, encompassing specifically the transition to first-time motherhood?’ I was interested in what women in the transition to first-time motherhood experienced and how they reflected on and interpreted these experiences. The subjective accounts of women tell a particular story, so, rather than administering a survey to a large group of women I focused on in-depth, semi-structured but flexible interviews as a way of discovering participant experiences as expressed in their own words. Having only a small number of interview participants meant that I was able to analyse my data closely in a way that would be difficult with a larger sample. In total, I conducted twenty-two interviews with twelve women during January and September, 2012. This included two interviews with ten participants and one interview with the remaining two participants. The first interview was conducted during the third trimester of pregnancy, ranging from 32 to 38 weeks. The second interview was undertaken postnatally when the babies ranged from 3 to 7 months of age. For participant demographic information, please refer to earlier publications (Johnson Maternal Devices; Intimate Mothering Publics). Interviewing late in pregnancy and early in new motherhood provided a realistic sense of the changes, both positive and negative, which occur during this transition as well as the – at times – deep rift between experience and expectation. The time between interviews was important as it allowed women time to adjust somewhat to life as a new mum, allowed time for reflection on both the pregnancy and the early months of mothering. The interviews were conversational and relaxed in nature and allowed to flow in the direction the participant chose to take. The women were generous in sharing intimate details of their experiences from conception through to motherhood. Their responses revealed different ways of being pregnant, being supported and responsibilised during pregnancy, and the different ways women cope with stress, anxiety and more. The stories also demonstrate the amount of work, thought and often deliberate self-transformation which occurs throughout pregnancy, and as a new mother. I believe my personal biography influenced the data that I collected during the interviews. My age and sex advantaged my position as an interviewer. Being a relatively young female researcher it was easy to develop rapport with the participants. In addition, being a woman likely increased my access, as a researcher, to the intimate experiences women shared throughout the interviews, especially considering the gendered and personal nature of the research. It was also apparent that my absence of first-hand experience of pregnancy and mothering enhanced the depth of interview data, encouraging participants to provide access to details and feelings that they may have believed were unnecessary to discuss had I also been a mother. Rebecca Horn discusses a similar experience in her research with prison inmates and police staff, which she describes as being due to her projected image as an “innocent abroad” (96). It also meant that participants were more likely to share details because my lack of experience meant that I was not in a position to judge these experiences against my own. Throughout the interviews, the participants often wanted to know more about me, asking me questions like: How old are you? Have you ever been pregnant? Do you have a partner? Does doing this research turn you off having children? Does doing this research make you want to have children? What do you plan to do after you’ve finished your thesis? Similar to other researchers who discuss their interview experiences in self-reflexive pieces Edwards, Finch and Oakley, I found that by sharing some of my own personal experiences I was able to establish trust and develop rapport with the participants. Like Kasper I worked with the assumption that each interview is a collaborative and consensual enterprise among women. I focused on earning trust, displaying sensitivity and fairness, and showing support. The participants expressed genuine interest in my research and the findings it was generating, with most women keen to read any published findings from the research. Many participants asked to have a copy of their interview transcripts for posterity or to reflect on with friends or in future pregnancies. ‘Getting Personal’ Now that I am contemplating the extension of my research into the future I must think about how my position as a researcher has changed. As one of my key interests is the ways in which digital technologies impact on parenting I have to ask myself whether I will use this broad range of technologies myself, as a parent. If I do use these technologies, will I insert myself into my research asking questions about my own user experiences and considering whether my partner uses these technologies in a different way to myself? If so, how, and what are the implications of this? I also need to consider my child amongst this, as both a parent and a researcher. Am I comfortable with my child having a digital life from a young age? I have already contemplated this question and made the conscious decision not to discuss or mention my pregnancy on social media, Facebook in particular. This question will again be important when my partner and I make decisions around the different ways we choose to announce the birth of our first child. These questions will continue to be important to me as a parent in an increasingly digitalised world. Until I become a mother, (some time in the next five weeks) I believe I cannot answer these questions. Rather, this article functions as a sounding board, allowing me to begin contemplating these questions in my future dual role as a mother and a researcher. Becoming a mother will change my position as a researcher in other important ways. I will no longer be the inexperienced, childless researcher. I will continue to treat my participants as partners in my research but being a mother myself, intersubjectivity, “the acknowledgment of the reciprocal sharing of knowledge and experience between the researcher and the researched” (Shields and Dervin 67), will become all the more essential to my approach.
Sophia Johnson (Thu,) studied this question.