Research methods are not neutral. There are different views on the value of both method and different methods and whether the use of theories plays a role in both study design and conclusions that can be drawn. Transferring media-bound methods from one medium to another is problematic because the methods used often carry a form of media understanding. What is problematic is that methods are often accompanied by a certain understanding that points to certain conclusions. It is linked to arguments about media and materiality, see for example about the media theory of Meyrowitz (1994). For example, it is problematic to use text-bound methods straight for audio or audiovisual media (see eg Hayles, 2004). See more Severson (2016) on method development linked to user-generated material and Leckner and Severson (2019) on method development as digital method triangulation.

Digital media is both an interesting object of study in itself and as a means to explore how to use digital media as methods (digital methods). Media is a way to describe the tools we use to communicate across distances, across time and to more people at once than we could with our own voice and body. In common usage “media” is for communicating with more than just one person. Digital media is also the elements made possible by the combination of computers, software, and networks: interactivity and group forming. When you look at it in this way, the most important parts of digital media are not simply the conversion of regular media to digital formats. Digital media is also taking advantage of new capabilities relating to interactivity and group forming.

For us scholars, probably the most significant aspect of “digitalness” is the accessibility and searchability that is offered with computerised media products compared to analogue media. Previous research methods often entailed great efforts on the material-gathering part of conducting a study. Furthermore, in the online and social media world, more information, such as social media interactions etc. are easily available for a large part of available media products, allowing us insights not only into the universe of the sender (as in classical content analysis), but also hints about the receptive sides (how many page views, “likes”, how many shares, etc where such things tell us something about how the readers have chosen to act based on the content).

There are different theories and principles for collection and analysis of digital media. Several new fields of research are suggested and being formed: digital humanities, new media studies, digital methods. What is important to understand is that these emerging fields are normative and also ideologically divided. This is particularly evident when evaluating the ethical aspects of the study of digital media. The Association of Internet Researchers is a wellknown, wellestablished and well-renowned initiative for internet ethics. Their approach to ethics is to use their ethics documents as a starting point for inquiries and reflection. They see the documents as enriched by comments and contributions, hoping that others – where we are – will continue to call attention to issues and resources in Internet research ethics for debate and deliberation by the ethics working committee.

Action research methodologies are inherently normative and have been discussed, used and criticized in various fields in media and journalism. Action research as method development is one issue in the research front in media and journalism studies (see for example Wagemans & Witschge, 2019). Participant-oriented initiatives that strengthen a good society are based on a more applied theoretical approach, where methodological aspects are involved. The collective knowledge development is important in an action research project. It can be called interactive research (Nielsen and Svensson, 2006), action research and participatory action research (Whyte, 2010). In digital media development, there is participatory design (Bödker and Pekkola, 2010). Classical qualitative data collection methods are interviews and observations, where the quest for understanding and qualities is crucial. Participant-oriented action research strives for interaction and joint knowledge production where the decisive factor is that some form of social change occurs. It is thus a more interventionist-based research, rather than as anthropology where participation is considered to prevent reflection and analysis. In participant-oriented action research, the goal is to go close, to do things together where the researcher from his position does not have the opportunity to create change without interaction with the participants. It is well in the international research front linked to media, see Löwgren and Reimer (2013). The classical theoretical concepts are such as “empowerment”, “participation” and “the commons”. Empowerment focuses on identifying capacity instead of risk and arguing for cooperation instead of authoritarian experts (Perkins and Zimmerman, 1995). Participation is about participating in an event (a situation, an action), which can be linked to political life as civic participation, but also to popular cultural phenomena as participatory culture (Jenkins et al, 2005). The commons describes resources held together, that are gifts and something in common (Barnes, 2006). The (new) concepts that are more connected to digital media development are crowd culture, open innovation and co-creation. Crowd culture is based on arguments about “wisdom of the crowds” where the collective intelligence is taken advantage of rather than an individual expert (Surowiecki, 2004). The phenomenon has also been referred to as collective action, when people create things together without traditional organizational structures (Shirky, 2008). Open innovation is the thesis that innovation and development should take place not only within businesses but also together with partners outside to share risk and reward (Chesbrough, 2003). It also coincides with “democratizing innovation” which claims that there is something democratizing in the fact that people participate in the development of products they use (von Hippel, 2005). Co-creation is partly used as a way of showing that value creation takes place in interaction between companies and consumers (Prahalad and Ramaswamy, 2004). Firstly, it points to a change for design, to go from user-centered design to designing with the users, with the opportunity to create new arenas for collective creativity (Sanders and Stappers, 2008). For a critical discussion on democratizing innovation, see Björgvinson and Severson (2014) and Severson (2014).

This paper discusses and presents: how to understand and use action research as critical digital methods? The idea is that in the meeting between classical and new concepts, analytical opportunities are created for both critical discussions and potential actions. It is argued that critical approaches in action research studies encompass theoretical foundation, methodological tradition and what digital media as data can and could mean for society.

The argument is that we need more advanced knowledge in the field of digital media and methods for sampling and analysis, concerning action research methods. We need further ability to integrate knowledge, analyse and manage complex phenomena, issues and situations. And finally, we need further developed ability and conditions to work independently and collectively with research, development or other qualified activities.

Critical digital method development can strengthen action research studies. To make this argument, the epistemological and ontological assumptions of action research as critical digital methods are explained first. Critical methods are an invitation “to engage reflexively on methods and their role in shaping your critical research” (Montgomerie, 2017, p. 1). The underlying argument of a critical methodological perspective is that methods can be part of a critical project only if it is seen as non-neutral approaches to organize empirical material and shape a research design. Hence, methods carry political visions (Montgomerie, 2017). Critical method development is the advancement of the contemporary study of a particular research field by considering how methods shape what is critical about a piece of research. See further in Severson (2019) in an example of critical digital method development in studies of media and terrorism.

This is followed by an argument of which applicable research designs that can be identified and described. Examples are given from Swedish and international examples of action research applications within media and journalism research. The discussion then focuses on methods for data collection within critical digital methods in relation to action research as creating knowledge together.

These issues are used as reference points for the discussion:

1. Reusing/renewing traditional methods in a digital context (”virtual methods”) and to separate ”found data” (automatically generated) and ”made data” (meaningful contextualised data) (Jensen, 2012)
2. Digitally created methods: methods that are ”embedded” in the units that process online data (Rogers, 2013).

The discussion highlights the value of stimulating innovative use of known methods for unexpected dimensions within the studied topic in relation to the tension with classical method concepts validity and reliability. The value of action research with appropriate theoretical and meta-theoretical reflections, are argued to provide more certainty in conclusions; and to be able to assist in constructing a more comprehensive perspective on specific analyses that otherwise are not made or not possible. The discussion includes particularly the value of awareness of the online-offline contexts as an onlife setting, being “inextricably interwoven” with each other (Simon & Ess, 2015: 157). Implications of this increased awareness can mean many things. It is argued that there are still few examples of action research making use of virtual and digital methods, even though they seem to be crucial in order to capture the complexities of the onlife. The paper ends with a reflection that critical interrogation of assumptions and biases of action research as part of configuring science needs further work.

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