research, each diary keeper was given a disposal camera to record people, objects or
places that had been important or influential in their lives since becoming ill, in both a
positive and negative sense. To avoid misrepresentation and decontextualisation of the
pictures, each person was asked to record the context in which each photograph was
taken. While some people used up their film within a few days, others took their
pictures over a period of several weeks, taking time to think about and decide upon
which experiences they wanted to represent visually. Respondents took photographs
which reflected their current emotions and experiences, as well as pictures of people
or objects that had had a significant or long lasting impact upon their lives, thus
adding further depth to the information recorded in the diaries. As has been recorded
elsewhere (Latham 2003; Young and Barrett 2001) autophotography used in
combination with other methods also enables triangulation of data, in this case with
the information recorded in the diaries and the wider research project.
Recording emotions
Kearns and Moon (2002) stress the need to move beyond snapshot studies to consider
the dynamic nature of the health and illness process. The time-consuming nature of
the case study interviews in the wider research meant that interviews were conducted
with HIV/AIDS afflicted households in which the ill person had already died. The
information recorded was often based upon events from several years past, which
although useful in providing a more reflective interpretation of the impact of
HIV/AIDS, presented a relatively static interpretation of the illness and caring
process, and reflected the emotions of the interviewee only on the day in which the
interview took place. In contrast, while some diary keepers provided a retrospective
account of some of their most memorable experiences, others wrote on most days,