UC Irvine

Recurrent or chronic pain affects 11-38% of children and adolescents. Pediatric pain research typically focuses on risk factors, such as anxiety and parent functional disability, but resilience-building, protective factors also play an important role in the pain experience. New methods to incorporate resilience-enhancing factors into pain research are needed. Photovoice is a highly participatory research method, where participants take photos to address a common question, caption their photos, and discuss the meaning of the photos in a group. The main objective of this study was to determine whether photovoice is an acceptable method to young people living with chronic pain for identifying and sharing sources of joy. Another objective was to explore sources of joy. Sixteen adolescents and young adults participated, which involved meeting in a group to discuss the goal of the study, taking photographs of self-identified sources of joy over a two-week period, and meeting as a group again to discuss the photographs and participate in a focus group about the experience. Results suggest that photovoice is an acceptable method, as all participants took photographs and attended both meetings, and three themes from the focus group data suggested the participants considered photovoice to be appropriate: 1.) Relief associated with meeting peers, 2.) Potential to benefit young people living with pain, and 3.) Potential to raise awareness. Three themes emerged from the discussion of the photographs to describe sources of joy: 1.) Gratitude for everyday pleasures and accomplishments, 2.) Support from pets, and 3.) Journey of acceptance. Results add to the strengths-based literature on pediatric pain by identifying an acceptable method that could be further explored for use as an intervention to enhance protective factors such as positive affect, gratitude, and social support and to compare the experiences of different populations of youth living with pain.