The Many Minds approach to group data analysis: a cat’s cradle?

In this editorial our intention is to describe the Many Minds approach to group data analysis and to contribute to current discussion about the affordances and pitfalls of collective research practices. We showcase work emerging from a particular research culture within the School of Education and Social Work at the University of Sussex and describe the way it has facilitated psychosocially informed qualitative data analysis. The editorial begins by locating the authors in terms of different traditions of collective research practice, identifying a confluence of three areas of methodological work: (1) psychoanalytically informed group seminar; (2) narrative approaches to sharing and reusing data; (3) feminist collective methodologies. The particular approach adopted in the special issue (which we distinguish from broader notions of collective research practices involving multiple minds) is then laid out in detail. The final part of the editorial explores the promises, perils and pitfalls of a Many Minds approach. We start and conclude with the image of a cat’s cradle – a string game where patterns are continuously transferred from hand to hand. In focusing on this image our intention is to amplify feminist methodologies that have occupied less space within psychosocial studies.