The Writing Processes and Importance of Quality Images for Self-Discovery in Poetic Inquiry

Poetic inquiry is a term used for a range of arts-based research (ABR), poetry writing methods. The core argument for these methods is that they facilitate insight into personal experience. This claim was evaluated and explicated in the current manuscript. Using a quantitative approach, the current study investigated the following questions: What are the writing processes through which poetic inquiry facilitates a process of self-discovery and to what degree does the quality of the arts-based product influence these self-understandings? The design for the current study followed the guidelines of the Hanauer (2022) study. A two-part, poetic inquiry protocol involving an initial elicitation stage and a second image generation/revision stage was interspersed with two points of measurement (after stage 1 and after stage 2) and two measures of self-discovery (insight and emotional clarity). 60 participants drawn from the Amazon MTurk website completed this task. Prior to statistical analysis, the generated poetic images were analyzed for their quality using a tri-part rating system relating to specificity, relatedness and depth of sensory information. Descriptive statistics, repeated-measures Friedman and Kruskal-Wallis H tests were used to consider the level of self-discovery elicited by each stage of the protocol, the relative change from the first to the second stage of writing and the influence of the quality of the poetic image on self-discovery. The descriptive results revealed mid to high levels of insight and emotional clarity elicited by the protocol at the initial experience elicitation stage. These levels were maintained without change following the second poetic image generation and revision. Participants who generated high quality images were found to have significantly higher levels of emotional clarity at the elicitation and revision stage of writing than participants with lower quality images. Higher emotional clarity as a result of the first experience elicitation stage seemed to enhance the quality of the poetic image that was written by the participant in the second stage, suggesting an accumulative process of self-discovery. Analyses of word counts and time on task revealed that faster times with more writing in the elicitation stage was related to high quality images, further reinforcing the importance of this stage of writing. Finally, in line with prior positions on ABR, the quality of the art produced was seen to be an important aspect of self-discovery, which suggests it should be evaluated when using an ABR approach.