One Step Closer to the Field: Visual Method in Marketing and Consumer Research

The purpose of this study is to examine the use of visual research methods in the area of recent marketing and consumer research. All articles published in Journal of Consumer Research (JCR), Journal of Marketing (JM), Journal of Marketing Research (JMR), Journal of Marketing Management (JMM), Consumption, Markets, and Culture (CMC), and Qualitative Market Research (QMR) from year 2002 to 2010 were examined. A total of one hundred and twenty two articles with images or pictures were selected for further analysis. This study found that a total of sixty research studies employed photograph or video as ‘projective stimuli’, a total of forty four research studies used ‘cultural inventories’, and seven research studies employed ‘social artifacts’. Overall, this study found that a growing number of marketing and consumer researchers utilize visual methods in various ways to achieve their research goals

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