Collective stereographic photo essays: an integrated approach to probing consumption experiences in depth

This paper proposes and illustrates an approach to probing a consumption experience in depth by means of integrating five perspectives on marketing or consumer research-namely, those that focus on (1) the nature of the consumption experience; (2) photography as a means of collecting data; (3) the photo essay as an approach to presenting findings; (4) stereography as a technique for enhancing the vividness, clarity, realism, and depth of the visual images used to represent consumption; and (5) collective collaboration as a way of applying the foregoing concerns to the gathering and communication of findings that represent a relevant group of consumers. Toward this end, the authors describe an integrative method and report an illustrative study of informants' verbal and pictorial responses to the topic "What New York Means To Me". When these inputs are focused on consumption experiences, captured via self-photography, explained by means of introspective vignettes, presented as printed stereo pairs or electronic 3-D anaglyphs, and analyzed as a collaborative sample of responses, they combine to generate a collective stereographic photo essay whose vividness, clarity, and realism help to probe the depths of this illustrative consumption experience. (C) 1998 Published by Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.