By the time I reached the data collection phase of the research, I had already gathered a great deal of insight from my literature review and critical reflections, but I knew that what I was looking for couldn’t be found in texts alone. I wanted to surface unspoken discomforts, unheard perspectives, and lived tensions around dress, modesty, and belonging in creative HE spaces. To do this, I designed a small, exploratory qualitative study combining a focus group with two asynchronous individual interviews.
This research was never about generalising. Instead, it was about making space for the subtle, emotional, and sometimes contradictory experiences that arise in classrooms where radical self-expression and religious/cultural modesty coexist, sometimes harmoniously, sometimes not.
RESEARCH DESIGN AND APPROACH
I adopted a qualitative, interpretivist approach rooted in the belief that knowledge is co-constructed, especially when working with embodied and culturally situated issues such as dress and identity. Inspired by reflexive thematic analysis (Braun and Clarke, 2021), I allowed themes to emerge through iterative engagement with the data, rather than imposing a rigid framework from the outset.
Methodologically, this took shape through one focus group, followed by two asynchronous individual interviews with participants from that same group. I added the interviews deliberately, not as an “extra”, but as a way to extend care and create a different kind of space: slower, more private, and less shaped by group dynamics. The intention was to give participants the opportunity to share anything they may have felt hesitant to voice in the moment, and to do so individually and anonymously, at their own pace.
Interestingly, it was the move into asynchronous, one-to-one reflection that most clearly confirmed the sensitivity of this topic. What emerged in those follow-up responses was not simply “more data”, but a clearer sense of how challenging it can feel to name discomfort around dress, faith, and perceived respect within a culture of inclusivity. In that sense, the method became part of the finding: the need for anonymity and time was itself evidence of how carefully these conversations are currently held, and how easily they can be silenced.
DATA COLLECTION
- Focus Group: Tabling the Conversation
The focus group brought together CSM MA level students from a mix of cultural and religious backgrounds, including those who identified as believers, agnostic, and non-religious. We explored a set of AI-generated outfit images designed to open up reflection across a broad spectrum, from bold, revealing looks to more modest, covered styles.
On Creating the Outfit Stimuli for the Focus Group
For this stage of the project, I chose not to use photographs of real students. Instead, I generated four outfit images using AI, drawing on multiple visual references that I input to produce variation in silhouette, coverage, texture, colour, and styling detail. The aim was not to create “representative” students, but to produce non-identifiable visual stimuli that could be discussed more safely.
This decision was shaped by ethics and pedagogy. Because the project explores how dress can trigger feelings of comfort, discomfort, neutrality, or belonging in shared creative learning spaces, using real students risked shifting attention from the outfit to the person, and inviting judgements or assumptions about identity, even with consent. AI helped keep the focus on observable features of dress while reducing the risk of personal exposure.
Using AI also supported methodological clarity. I designed the four outfits to differ across visually verifiable variables, including coverage, opacity, layering, silhouette volume, and the presence or absence of text or graphics. This created a more consistent basis for discussion and helped me separate description from interpretation when analysing participant responses.
Below, I present a short, objective description of the four outfits, alongside a comparison table focusing exclusively on observable variables. The descriptions intentionally avoid interpretation or value judgement, establishing a neutral baseline for later analysis. I also include screenshots documenting the process of using ChatGPT to generate and refine the outfit stimuli from multiple visual references, to make the image-production method transparent.
Here is the Miro board I used during the focus group.
I’ve broken it down into sections and shared as screenshots to improve readability.
Below I include my moderator notes, the session transcript and the participant consent forms links:
2. Asynchronous Individual Interviews: Listening More Closely
After the focus group, I invited participants to share further reflections through asynchronous individual interviews, mainly to reduce the social pressure of speaking “in the room” and to offer a quieter, more anonymous space for anything that felt too delicate, unfinished, or hard to phrase publicly. What these follow-ups gave me was a slightly different register of insight: participants wrote more openly about how personal style can feel, and how real the fear of “unintentionally offending someone” can be when commenting on clothes tied to identity.
One participant described the experience as unexpectedly introspective, noticing how quickly we attach cultural connotations to colours, accessories, and silhouettes, and how they “struggled” to express their perceptions while still respecting the intent behind someone’s style.
Another reflected on context and behaviour as shaping interpretation, and noted the group’s hesitation to voice anything that might sound negative, suggesting that more time and probing could have surfaced richer disagreement.
Collectively, these interviews didn’t just add detail; they confirmed the sensitivity of the topic and the careful self-monitoring it can evoke.
References
Braun, V. and Clarke, V. (2021) Thematic Analysis: A Practical Guide. London: SAGE Publications Ltd.