Event Interviews: A Visual Tool to Study Shocks,Change and Adaptation

Abstract

This article introduces a methodological tool for the study of change and adaptation: event interviews. Individual and family lives marked by constant change at both macro and micro levels, recession and growth, marriage and divorce trigger the need for adaptation. Understanding how these events shape individual experiences and trajectories requires methods that account for both time and context. Developed in the context of the project Child poverty and neighbourhood opportunity structures: managing on low-income in Barcelona, as a tool to study responses to financial shocks, event interviews combine timeline methods with resource identification to capture family strategies in response to key events. The tool assists researchers in exploring the interplay between agency and constraint, personal experience, and institutional contexts, providing rich data into adaptation processes. By structuring data collection around participant-identified events, the method facilitates a detailed analysis of resource mobilization strategies over time. Additionally, the visual timeline encourages participants to articulate emotions and recognize patterns, bridging emic (participant-centred) and etic (researcher-centred) perspectives. The article discusses the development and application of event interviews, illustrates their potential through cases from the project, and reflects on their methodological advantages and limitations. It concludes with recommendations for researchers interested in employing this approach to explore the dynamic interactions between individuals, families, and changing circumstances.

Introduction

Individual and family lives are characterized by constant change. At the macro-level changing social and economic conditions, such as a recession, a period of expansion or welfare reforms, all affect individuals and families to different extents. Life trajectories themselves are characterised by change: processes of family formation or separation, job market entry, retirement and so on. In turn social actors respond to these micro and macro events by making use of the social, economic, and personal resources available to them. This paper introduces a tool, event interviews, specifically designed to capture processes of change and adaptation through a visual tool.

Understanding change and adaptation requires a long view perspective and specific methods that capture time variation as well as the resources available to individuals and families. Visual methods, as highlighted by Gauntlett (2007) and Rose (2017), engage participants’ emotional and cognitive processes, fostering deeper reflection on their lived experiences. For instance, photo-elicitation techniques (Harper, 2002) have been shown to prompt participants to access and express emotions and memories that might otherwise remain unspoken. Event interviews were developed in the context of the project Child poverty and neighbourhood opportunity structures: managing on low-income in Barcelona. The project aimed at studying families’ responses to financial shocks in Barcelona, with a focus on families with children. Child poverty is a significant problem in Spain and in the city, with one in three children living in poverty at any given time (Eurostat, 2024). The poverty literature shows that families in poverty are more exposed to changes in economic circumstances and financial shocks than their wealthier counterparts (Colarieti et al., 2024; Deckard & Auyero, 2022; Lanau & Lozano, 2024). In this context, the project aimed to assess how families with children manage the resources available to them (including income, but also networks, public and private services) to address financial shocks or events. Henceforth the word strategy is used to refer to the combination of resources—economic but also networks, services, and so on—that individuals and families deploy to respond to changing circumstances. The term aims to reflect the dynamic interaction between choices and constraints families encounter when facing a financial shock (Deckard & Auyero, 2022). Importantly, our approach aims to avoid “reducing people to their hardships,” as emphasized by Desmond and Western (2018, p. 310). Instead, it seeks to recognize the constrained but deliberate choices made by individuals and families within the structural limitations they face. While initially designed for the study of financial strain, event interviews the potential to be used to study wider processes of change and adaptation.

Event interviews allow for a joint reflection of both agency and constraint by linking personal experiences to institutional contexts through the analysis of resource availability and use. Similar methodologies, such as life histories, have demonstrated their potential for capturing this interplay in diverse settings (Singh et al., 2019; Veronese et al., 2021). These approaches highlight that, while freedom of action may be limited, decisions are still made, shaped by both personal circumstances and broader institutional frameworks. Event interviews combine calendar or timeline methods with a detailed identification of family resources to study their responses to changes in their environment. Chronological or timeline methods are specifically designed to capture the temporal dimension and, as such, are often used in narrative interviews based on the biographical method (Söderström, 2020). Like other timeline methods, event interviews use a visual timeline to help interviewees build their narrative by locating their experiences in time (Kolar et al., 2015).

By identifying and exploring responses to significant events the tool assists in capturing which resources are mobilized, how and when. Data collection is structured around a significant event identified by the participants. Departing from this event, interviewees are prompted to think about any resources they used to respond or attempt to respond to it. Resources are interpreted in a wide sense comprising economic resources such as savings, institutional resources (public services, subsidies, community organizations) as well as social resources in the form of friends and family networks (Revilla et al., 2017). During the interview if a resource is not mentioned, interviewers prompt the respondent to make sure all resources are mapped. Finally, strategies and resources are located in the timeline to support respondents’ narratives.

Event interviews serve as a complementary tool to semi-structured interviews enriching detail in data collection. The visual element of the tool allows participants to express emotions and recognize patterns that may be difficult to articulate verbally (Rodó-Zárate, 2021). During the process of analysis, the tool helped highlight the divergence of meanings between participants (emic) and researchers (etic) understandings (Agar, 2011; Creswell, 2013; Pike, 2015) of key concepts such as critical events, poverty, and economic vulnerability. The emic perspective focuses on capturing the personal and specific meanings attributed by the participants themselves, while the etic perspective provides an external, comparative framework that enables researchers to analyse these concepts in a more universally applicable way. Our tool aims to present both perspectives side by side to provide a more nuanced understanding of households’ responses to financial hardship and, more broadly, of the processes of change and adaptation. Indeed, visual tools such as timelines can support cognitive processes related to memory retrieval and reflection, helping participants to recall and articulate experiences more effectively (see, e.g., Conway, 2005; Fivush, 2011), making them an effective tool to reconstruct processes.

The remainder of the paper is organized as follows. The following section offers a necessarily brief overview of tools and approaches previously used for the study of change and adaptation. Section three introduces ‘event interviews’ as developed for their use in the project. Section four presents some of the project results through two cases: Nicole and Camila, that represent two approaches to timeline building. Throughout the discussion we reflect on the advantages and limitations of the method. The paper concludes with some final considerations and recommendations for those interested in applying the method.

The Study of Change and Adaptation

Adaptation is an inherently dynamic process, thus understanding it requires methods that can capture its temporal dimension. Longitudinal designs have long been the gold standard for studying social change. Hollstein (2021) emphasizes the value of longitudinal approaches for uncovering the nuanced interplay between individual agency and structural constraints in complex social processes. Longitudinal qualitative designs methods provide rich insights into the processes of adaptation over time, revealing the ways in which individuals experience and navigate economic difficulties and other life events (Dwyer & Patrick, 2021; Hollstein, 2021). In poverty research, qualitative longitudinal studies have challenged common stereotypes of the poor by revealing the multiple ways in which they adapt to adversity, with findings that highlight the complexity of their lived experiences (Dwyer & Patrick, 2021; MacDonald & Shildrick, 2013; Thomson et al., 2002). While powerful, longitudinal studies are often costly and time-consuming, limiting their applicability in many research contexts. (Treanor et al., 2021). As a result, researchers have sought alternative methods that can capture the dynamics of adaptation while enhancing timeliness and affordability.

These alternatives include the use of hypotheticals (Colarieti et al., 2024), focus groups (Daly et al., 2023), and narrative interviews (Dagdeviren et al., 2017), all of which provide valuable insights into how individuals and families cope with changing circumstances. Surprisingly, timeline methods remain relatively underutilized in the study of financial shocks and adaptation. Timeline methods have proven highly effective in various fields, including studies on climate adaptation (Luyts et al., 2024), health-seeking behaviours (Hurtubise & Joslin, 2023; Phillimore et al., 2021), or women’s experiences of war (Veronese et al., 2021). These methods are particularly useful for organizing and eliciting detailed information about participants’ experiences over time, facilitating recall and helping to structure interviews.

In addition to their utility in organizing data, the visual elements of timeline methods can promote reflexivity and ethical data collection by placing participants at the center of the narrative construction. Rodó-Zárate (2021) underscores the capacity of visual methodologies more widely not only to facilitate participant reflection but also to reveal the interplay between emotions, spatial dynamics, and structural inequalities, making them particularly valuable when working with marginalized groups. Thanks to their visual element, timelines are often seen as an ideal tool for researching sensitive issues and marginalized populations (Veronese et al., 2021). By allowing participants to visually map their experiences, timelines encourage them to reflect on the events that shaped their lives, while also providing researchers with valuable insights into the meaning of those experiences (Ellis et al., 1997; Kolar et al., 2015). This makes timelines an invaluable tool for studying poverty and economic vulnerability, as they enable researchers to capture not just the events themselves but also the personal meanings participants attribute to those events (Berends, 2011; Kolar et al., 2015; Sheridan et al., 2011; Veronese et al., 2021).

The origins of timeline methods lie in biographical research, particularly in sociology (Chicago School) (Thomas & Znaniecki, 1958), social psychology (Allport, 1962), and social anthropology (Langness, 1965), where the focus has traditionally been on exploring long periods of time or key life events. Biographical methods were designed to help identify and contextualize turning points or critical life events (Lawson et al., 2007; Singh et al., 2019; Veronese et al., 2021). While often associated with longer timeframes, timelines are also increasingly being adapted to explore shorter processes or more focused time periods. For example, timeline methods have been employed in health research to explore the emotional journeys of cancer patients (Thygesen et al., 2011) and in studies of disaster impact and recovery to understand adaptation and response processes (Luyts et al., 2024; Sword-Daniels et al., 2015).

Some studies even mix both long- and short-time frames, further showing the flexibility of the method. Veronese et al. (2021) asked participants to complete both an individual timeline using a ‘life events calendar’ to identify significant moments in their personal lives, and a joint timeline focusing on a broader social or historical context, such as the Palestinian experience. This combination of timelines allows for a more nuanced understanding of both personal and collective experiences.

Timelines are often used alongside other research methods, such as semi-structured interviews or focus groups, thus combining multiple approaches within a single study. For example, the Timescapes project used both timelines and relational networks to complement in-depth interviews with young people, providing a comprehensive view of their experiences (Hanna & Lau-Clayton, 2012).

Building on this rich tradition, our study contributes to advancing the use of timeline methods by applying them specifically to the study of financial shocks and adaptation. While timeline methods have been effectively utilized in fields such as health, disaster recovery, and biographical research, their application to economic vulnerability remains underexplored. This article shows how timelines, when combined with semi-structured interviews, can capture both the temporal dynamics of adaptation and the agency exercised by families within constrained opportunity structures. By refining and contextualizing this approach, we provide a methodological framework that not only deepens our understanding of how families navigate economic challenges but also highlights the potential of timeline methods to bridge the gap between qualitative depth and practical feasibility in social research.

Methods

Setting, Sampling and Design

The data used in this article was collected in three neighbourhoods in Barcelona (Spain), all characterized by high levels of deprivation but differing in their sociodemographic composition and the density of social and community organizations. The study included families diverse in origin, available resources, and socioeconomic trajectories. Some families experienced persistent poverty, others faced short-lived financial strain, while still others had experienced downward mobility. Comparing the experiences of these families enabled us to identify the role of both family resources and contextual factors—such as neighbourhood characteristics and public service provision—on their responses to economic shocks.

The study aimed to develop a comprehensive understanding of how families with children in Spain navigate economic constraints. We used purposive sampling to capture a diverse range of experiences rather than striving for statistical representativeness, aligning with qualitative research principles (Crouch & McKenzie, 2006; Guest et al., 2013). In total 29 families were interviewed for the project. Since our focus here is chiefly methodological rather than substantial, we focus here on two cases to help illustrate the characteristics, advantages, and limitations of the method.

Participants were selected based on three criteria: residing in one of the selected neighbourhoods, experiencing economic difficulties, and having children in the household. Collaboration with local social services and community organizations was instrumental in recruitment, with these partners distributing flyers and providing preliminary information about the study. Interested participants contacted the study coordinators for more information, ensuring voluntary and informed participation.

The interviews were carefully designed to explore critical events of economic vulnerability, the strategies families employed to cope with these events, and the role of service provision and community organizations. The interview guide was developed based on a thorough review of relevant literature and consultations with experts in the field, ensuring it captured the complexity of family strategies in the context of economic hardship.

In addition to semi-structured interviews, participants utilized a graphic timeline technique to visually represent key events of economic vulnerability, their perceived causes, the coping strategies employed, and the outcomes. This method was specifically designed to facilitate the expression of emotions and uncover patterns that may be difficult to articulate verbally, thereby enriching the qualitative data (Bagnoli, 2009; Kolar et al., 2015; Sheridan et al., 2011).

The conceptualization of the graphic timeline emerged to chronologically map participants’ significant economic events while capturing the interplay of various influencing factors. The design process was informed by existing literature on visual data collection methods, which highlighted their potential to facilitate deeper emotional and cognitive engagement. This innovative approach allowed us to document not just the sequence of events but also their broader contextual and emotional dimensions, offering a comprehensive understanding of family strategies and outcomes.

Event Interviews: Analysing Responses to Events

The project’s main objective was to gain a detailed understanding of families’ strategies for addressing financial challenges, with the aim of both advancing scholarship and informing policy. With that objective in mind, we developed a tool that complements the traditional semi-structured interview: the event interview. Event interviews combine timeline methods with a detailed identification of family resources to gain an in-depth understanding of families’ strategies to cope with financial difficulties. The tool is specifically designed to elicit detailed, context-rich data from participants, focusing on the events they identify as critical to their economic trajectories and the strategies they deployed in response to such events. The graphic timeline component allows participants and researchers to visually map out significant events, highlighting their sequence, interconnectedness, and the resources mobilized during periods of economic difficulty. This visual approach offers insights that may remain obscured in purely verbal accounts (Kolar et al., 2015). This was valuable so as to elicit the identification of resources that may not appear in initial narratives as well as to develop an in depth understanding of family responses to financial shocks.

By integrating graphic timelines with semi-structured interviews, this methodology facilitates a comprehensive understanding of participants’ experiences. The visual element encourages engagement and reflexivity, prompting participants to reflect on their experiences in detail and fostering nuanced discussions (Gauntlett, 2007; Söderström, 2020). Additionally, the method allows researchers to capture the emic perspectives of participants, emphasizing the meanings they themselves attribute to their experiences of poverty and economic vulnerability. As we will see, participants perspectives and perceptions do not always match those of researchers. Where that was the case, participant’s views were always recorded.

It is crucial to emphasize that these graphic timelines serve as a complementary tool rather than a standalone method. Their integration into semi-structured interviews enhances the depth and quality of the data collected, combining the strengths of visual and verbal techniques to capture both the temporal and contextual dimensions of participants’ narratives.

In summary, our methodological approach positions participants as active agents in the research process, enabling them to share their voices and experiences through a combination of verbal storytelling and visual illustration. This approach not only enriches the data but also provides a multifaceted understanding of how low-income families navigate economic challenges, underscoring the interplay between personal agency and structural constraints.

Data Collection

Ethical Considerations

Given the sensitive nature of the study, several ethical precautions were implemented to protect participants’ rights and welfare. Participants were informed about the aims, procedures, and potential risks of the study. Informed consent was obtained prior to the interviews, emphasizing participants’ voluntary involvement and their right to withdraw from the study at any time without repercussions.

As a gesture of appreciation and reciprocity, participants received a small financial compensation in the form of a prepaid card redeemable for educational materials, toys, and child-oriented items. This was designed to acknowledge their time and expertise with practical support. Additionally, upon concluding the study, workshops and community activities were organized in the neighbourhoods where the participants lived. These activities acted as spaces for encounter and exchange among women, fostering community bonds and offering practical and material support.

The study adhered to established ethical guidelines for research involving human participants and received approval from the Commission on Ethics in Animal and Human Experimentation (reference number: CEEAH 6366).

Interview Process

Interviews were conducted in private spaces provided by collaborating agencies to ensure confidentiality and participant comfort. Before the interviews, researchers explained the process, provided consent information sheets, and addressed any questions. Written consent was obtained, and anonymity was maintained throughout the study.

Each interview lasted between 40 and 60 min and was audio-recorded and transcribed for analysis. The combination of semi-structured interviews and graphic timelines ensured the collection of both verbal and visual data, enriching the depth of the narratives.

The interviews were designed to capture a comprehensive understanding of family experiences and comprised two complementary components: a semi-structured interview and a visual timeline exercise. The semi-structured interviews explored key aspects of participants’ lives, including household composition, economic position, housing status, and satisfaction with neighbourhood services. These questions provided essential context about family resources and needs, forming a foundation for the subsequent timeline activity.

The visual timeline exercise followed the general interview and encouraged participants to identify and chronologically map events in their lives, that triggered economic vulnerability or stress, what we label ‘critical events.’ Participants were encouraged to define what constituted a critical event, fostering a personal and context-specific narrative. The researcher reviewed the resources identified in the timeline and interview and prompted about potential resources that had not been mentioned, such as family support, neighbours, or use of public services. For instance, after a participant described a financial shock, the interviewer would ask, “Did anyone outside your immediate family help you during this period?” or “Were there any community organizations or public services you turned to?” This iterative prompting, combined with the visual mapping of events and resources, often led participants to recall and articulate additional forms of support or strategies that were not mentioned initially.

While most participants focused on events from the past two years, the timelines varied in scope. For instance, one participant began their timeline in 1989 but later narrowed their focus to the 2021–2023 period, whereas others started with the 2008 housing crisis. This flexibility enabled participants to adapt the timeline to their unique circumstances, reflecting diverse temporal spans and life experiences.

Participants created their timelines in whichever format they found meaningful—linear or non-linear. This flexibility was intentional, allowing for personal expression and ensuring that the timeline captured the lived reality of each participant, as opposed to enforcing a rigid structure. The use of non-linear or flexible formats was designed to better reflect the multifaceted and dynamic nature of personal experiences (Bagnoli, 2009; Kolar et al., 2015; Sheridan et al., 2011). For those who requested assistance, researchers helped construct the timelines based on participants’ instructions and co-validated the final representations to ensure they accurately reflected their narratives. The timelines documented the causes of critical events, the strategies employed, and the outcomes.

This dual approach—integrating verbal and visual methods—offered rich, multidimensional insights into participants’ experiences, illuminating not only the events themselves but also the strategies and contextual factors shaping their responses to economic challenges.

Data Analysis

The interview transcripts and graphic timelines were subjected to a rigorous process of thematic coding aimed at uncovering the complex dynamics of how families navigate economic challenges. Thematic analysis was conducted iteratively, combining insights from both verbal and visual data to provide a comprehensive understanding of participants’ experiences. The process began with open coding, where the interview transcripts and timelines were reviewed in detail to identify emerging themes and patterns related to economic vulnerability, coping strategies, and outcomes. This initial stage aimed to capture a broad range of responses, ensuring that the analysis remained grounded in participants’ narratives. To enhance objectivity, the initial coding was carried out by a lead researcher who had not been involved in data collection.

The codes generated in this phase were then refined collaboratively by the research team through a series of meetings. These sessions enabled the team to critically evaluate and consolidate the themes, ensuring that the coding framework accurately reflected the richness and diversity of the data. This collaborative approach also facilitated the alignment of the codes with the study’s research questions, strengthening the analytical rigor.

A key aspect of the analysis involved standardizing the hand-drawn timelines into a digital format using a graphic design platform (Canva). This process consisted of transcribing all events, resources, and temporal markers into structured fields, which facilitated systematic comparison and coding across cases. Digitizing the timelines enhanced the identification of patterns and connections that were less visible in the original paper versions, but were apparent in the oral transcripts. Aligning the timelines in digital format highlighted common sequences of events, shared strategies, and recurring outcomes, offering unique insights into how families responded to economic challenges. For example, the digitized timelines allowed us to track the resources families mobilized over time, the interplay of factors influencing their strategies, and instances where efforts to overcome challenges were unsuccessful.

While the digital standardization enhanced analytical precision, we were mindful of its potential limitations. The process of unifying visual data could potentially obscure individual nuances and the unique expressions present in the original drawings. To mitigate this risk, the analysis of digitized timelines was consistently cross-referenced with the original versions, ensuring that the individual context and richness of each participant’s narrative were preserved.

The final stage of the analysis involved synthesizing themes from both the verbal and visual data. This integrated approach enabled a holistic understanding of participants’ experiences, capturing the temporal and contextual dimensions of economic vulnerability. The combination of visual timelines and interview narratives revealed the interplay between individual agency and structural factors, offering a nuanced view of family strategies and their outcomes.

Throughout the analytical process, the research team maintained a reflexive stance, acknowledging the social and power dynamics inherent in qualitative research. The timelines, such as Nicole’s (Figure 1) and Camila’s (Figure 2), exemplify this approach by visually illustrating participants’ narratives and strategies. Nicole’s timeline highlights the cumulative impact of interconnected events like her child’s birth and the loss of family income, while Camila’s reveals the temporal complexity of adapting to prolonged economic vulnerability. These visuals not only enrich the narrative analysis but also center participants’ voices, ensuring their experiences are authentically represented. Our results highlight the potential of combining innovative and participatory methods to capture the lived experiences of economic vulnerability. By embracing the complexity and reflexivity inherent in these methods, researchers can gain deeper insights while remaining attentive to the ethical and methodological challenges that arise (Banks, 2018; Saldana, 2015).

Figure 1.

Nicole’s digitised timeline

Figure 2.

Original timeline hand drawn by Nicole

Findings

What Constitutes a ‘Critical Event’?

Given the exploratory nature of this study, we adopted a broad definition of a “critical event.” Our goal was to understand what participants themselves perceived as events leading to economic stress, acknowledging that these may differ from those typically identified in the literature. To achieve this, we asked respondents to identify a specific event that had caused financial strain, particularly in the recent past. Importantly, we did not prescribe the type of event, instead allowing participants to construct their own narratives based on their subjective experiences.

The identification of an event as significant or consequential proved to be a subjective process, resulting in considerable variation among respondents. Six main categories of events were identified: health-related events, unexpected expenses, labour market changes, childbirth, reductions in in-kind benefits, and evictions. These events were often interconnected; for example, Camila (see Figure 3) experienced both illness and job loss as mutually reinforcing stressors, as an injury meant she could not return to her work as a carer. Labor market precariousness—characterized by irregular employment, self-employment, and income uncertainty—was a recurring theme in most narratives. While these factors often served as primary triggers (e.g., job loss), they frequently interacted with other events, such as rising costs or health crises compounding difficulties.

Figure 3.

Camila’s digitised timeline

Temporal dimensions also varied significantly. About half of the participants identified one or several events that occurred at specific points in time. For example, Nicole’s timeline centred on the death of a family member, which she identified as a turning point. However, as her case demonstrates, preceding circumstances—such as the pandemic—often heightened vulnerability, creating a complex interplay of stressors over time. In contrast, other participants viewed current economic challenges as the cumulative result of prolonged experiences rather than isolated events. For instance, some respondents traced their difficulties back to global events, such as the 2008 housing crisis, or personal experiences, such as migration. These past disruptions often compounded over time, straining family resources and eroding their capacity to adapt to new challenges. Finally, a subset of respondents, particularly those experiencing chronic vulnerability, struggled to identify specific turning points. This was more common among households with migratory backgrounds. In some cases, turning points became apparent during data analysis, even if participants themselves did not explicitly identify them. These findings underscore the multifaceted nature of economic vulnerability. While focusing on specific events facilitated a deeper exploration of adaptive strategies, it also highlighted the cumulative and interconnected factors that shape economic stress.

Families’ Responses to Critical Events

The strategies that families employ to address critical events are deeply conditioned by their pre-existing resources and vulnerabilities. By centring the interview on a specific recent event, we sought to isolate family responses to particular challenges from their broader economic position at the time. However, this distinction was not always straightforward, as families often employed coping strategies prior to the event, particularly if they were already experiencing economic difficulties. To illustrate these dynamics, we present two cases: Nicole and Camila. These cases highlight distinct yet overlapping challenges, showcasing how families navigate critical events in contexts of limited resources. In both cases we present the digitised timeline and the original as drawn by participants.

Nicole, a 22-year-old woman originally from Honduras, has lived in Barcelona for the past decade. She is married and has a 3-year-old daughter. Both Nicole and her husband are employed. They share a household with her husband’s extended family, totalling eight people, including two children. This living arrangement arose as a response to compounding economic difficulties in 2020.

Nicole marked three critical events in her timeline, circled in grey, that illustrate how pre-existing vulnerabilities can escalate when multiple stressors occur simultaneously. The first two events coincided in 2020, marking the beginning of a challenging period for her family. Nicole’s daughter was born just before the COVID-19 pandemic, an already transformative moment in her life. However, the onset of the pandemic brought severe economic repercussions: the couple was forced to close a small shop they had recently opened, losing their primary source of income. To manage this financial shock, they moved in with her husband’s family, pooling resources to reduce living expenses. The couple was saving to rent their own place, but a third event altered their plans. In late 2022 a close family member passed away after a prolonged illness. During the illness, Nicole’s husband reduced his working hours to provide care, further straining the family’s finances. Following the relative’s death, Nicole and her husband used all their savings to cover funeral and related expenses, as they were the only family members with financial reserves. This setback significantly delayed their plans to secure independent housing.

Despite these challenges, Nicole remains optimistic. In 2023, she applied for social housing, which she sees as a potential turning point for her family’s stability. Although the waiting list is long, Nicole is confident that securing a social rental will enable them to regain financial security and save for future goals. These positive and negative events are visually marked in her own drawing as steps up and down.

Camila’s timeline also contains multiple events but is very different. Her experience is one of precarious migration, compounded by successive critical events, which led to economic hardship, reliance on social aid, and eventual health struggles. Her own timeline illustrates all the incidences in which she and her family received support. Camila arrived in Barcelona from Sweden in August 2018, although she is originally from Chile. They initially cohabited with family, who helped them access support from social services and local charitable organizations. In 2019 they attempted to buy a small studio but it turned out to be a scam and the family lost their savings. This setback, combined with their lack of essential household items, led her to seek assistance from social services to furnish their flat through a local organisation.

In 2020–2021, the pandemic emerged as another major disruption. Camila and her husband lost their jobs, exacerbating their economic difficulties. At this point, their reliance on food aid ceased because Camila could no longer access it while balancing care responsibilities and pandemic restrictions.

During 2022–2023, Camila could access the childhood fund, a city council allowance providing €100 per month for children under 16. She highlighted the recurring uncertainty of this support and its eventual discontinuation, which added further instability to her family’s situation.

While Camila’s own drawing contains only positive events, instances of help, the event interview elicited also information on negative events. The most recent critical event occurred in October 2023, when Camila experienced medical negligence that resulted additional health complications. This incident not only impacted her well-being and ability to work but also underscored the compounded vulnerabilities caused by inadequate access to reliable healthcare services. In this case, since the event was very recent, the timeline did not capture additional responses. Camila’s timeline highlights a complex interplay of migration challenges, economic precarity, and systemic gaps in social and healthcare support, showing how interconnected events over time deepened her family’s vulnerability. The figure also illustrates how help and support are negotiated over time. Rather than a pattern of event response, her case is illustrative of extended processes of vulnerability, where resources are juggled to meet daily needs.

Discussion

Event interviews have demonstrated their value as an innovative tool for understanding how families navigate critical events and adapt to changes in their circumstances. By combining visual timelines with narrative interviews, this method provides a rich, detailed account of participants’ experiences, revealing both the immediate responses to shocks and the broader strategies of resilience and adaptation. Studies suggest that visual methods, such as graphic timelines, encourage participants to reflect more deeply on their experiences by engaging both emotional and cognitive processes (Gauntlett, 2007; Rose, 2007). The visual representation of events prompts participants to reflect on and articulate patterns in their lives that might otherwise remain unnoticed, offering a deeper understanding of how agency operates within the constraints of limited opportunity structures (Emirbayer & Mische, 1998). One of the key strengths of this approach was the ability of the timeline method to facilitate participant engagement and reflexivity. The visual element allowed participants to articulate complex events and strategies that might have been difficult to convey verbally. This not only enriched the data but also empowered participants, positioning them as co-creators of knowledge. For the most vulnerable families, whose voices are often excluded from policy and academic discussions, this participatory dimension was particularly valuable. For instance, Camila (see Figure 4) chose to construct her timeline in a distinctly positive framework, focusing on moments of growth and resilience, even though she was not explicitly prompted to do so. Her decision not only highlighted her agency but also underscored the method’s capacity to adapt to participants’ individual narratives and perspectives, further enriching the data and reinforcing their centrality in the research process. This approach fosters interactions that go beyond simple verbal descriptions, enabling participants to express complex emotions and recognize connections between events in ways that enhance the narrative (Bagnoli, 2009; Rodó-Zárate, 2021). For researchers, the visual timeline served as a concrete reference point during the interview, enabling more effective prompts, identification of gaps or inconsistencies in real time, and facilitating a more dynamic and interactive exchange with participants.

Figure 4.

Original timeline hand drawn by Camila

One of the most significant advantages of this method lies in its ability to capture not only isolated turning points—such as a divorce, the birth of a child, or an eviction—but also processes of cumulative disadvantage, where smaller, repeated setbacks compound over time to exacerbate vulnerability. The case of Nicole, for example, illustrates how interconnected events like the birth of her daughter, the pandemic, and economic losses shaped her family’s trajectory. Through the timeline, these experiences were not only recorded but also contextualized within broader social and economic systems, highlighting how structural constraints influence families’ adaptive strategies. Digitizing these timelines further enriched the analysis, as it allowed researchers to identify deeper patterns and compare cases more effectively. The process of digitizing the timelines further underscored the tension between standardization and preserving individual nuance. While digitization facilitated the identification of patterns and sequences across participants, it risked losing the unique, personal aspects of the hand-drawn versions. This highlights the importance of maintaining a balance between methodological rigor and the authenticity of participants’ original representations.

Despite these strengths, the study also revealed several challenges and limitations that influence the effectiveness of event interviews. The quality of the data collected often depended on circumstantial factors, such as the interview setting and the time available for the exercise. The flexibility of the timeline exercise, while a strength in terms of participant-centeredness, occasionally led to difficulties in standardization. Some participants required more guidance or direct assistance in creating their timelines, which introduced an element of researcher intervention. Although care was taken to validate the final timelines with participants, the potential for influencing their narratives cannot be entirely discounted. Additionally, the varied temporal spans chosen by participants—ranging from months to decades—necessitated careful contextualization during analysis to ensure comparability across cases. Interviews conducted in focused, uninterrupted settings produced richer narratives compared to those carried out in more casual or time-constrained environments. While this is often the case with any interview, we found that lack of familiarity or comfort with active and visual methods enhanced this issue. Similarly, participants’ literacy, language proficiency, and cultural backgrounds played a critical role in shaping the detail of the timelines. In cases where participants faced language barriers or lacked confidence in their writing abilities, the involvement of mediators, while necessary, sometimes diluted the richness and depth of the data. Addressing these disparities is essential for enhancing the inclusivity of the method and ensuring that all participants, regardless of their background, can fully express their experiences.

The variability in how participants documented events also posed challenges for comparative analysis. The analysis process has proven to be time intensive. While the flexibility of the timeline exercise allows for rich individual narratives, it can result in inconsistencies in how timeframes are defined or how events are described (Flick, 2018). This lack of standardization complicates cross-case comparisons, particularly when timelines vary in depth or focus. Developing clearer guidelines for participants—for example, providing structured prompts or standardized temporal criteria—could mitigate these challenges while preserving the narrative richness that makes this method so valuable.

Compared to longitudinal qualitative research (i.e. the “gold standard”), which requires repeated interactions with participants over time, event interviews offer a more resource-efficient way to capture temporal dynamics. While longitudinal approaches provide unparalleled insights into how practices and resources evolve, they are logistically demanding and costly. Event interviews, by reconstructing participants’ recent experiences and their responses to change, balance depth with practicality, addressing issues of recall without the need for sustained engagement. However, integrating longitudinal elements —such as follow-up interviews or revisiting timelines at later stages—could further enhance the method’s capacity to track longer-term adaptation processes.

Ultimately, the iterative combination of visual and narrative elements in event interviews offers unique insights that transcend those provided by either method alone. By capturing the interplay between participants’ perceptions and the structural constraints they face, this approach illuminates the complex ways in which families exercise agency within their environments. Like longitudinal qualitative approaches, which provide detailed perspectives on how individuals and families adapt to evolving circumstances over time (Treanor et al., 2021) event interviews reconstruct dynamic trajectories that reveal the cumulative impact of critical life events (Hollstein, 2021). The visual timelines not only help participants articulate their experiences but also enable researchers to uncover nuances and patterns that might otherwise remain hidden (Charmaz, 2006; Strauss & Corbin, 1998). Despite the challenges encountered, the method’s ability to elicit detailed, reflective narratives makes it an invaluable tool for studying how families navigate critical life events. With further refinement—such as addressing inclusivity challenges, improving standardization, and integrating digital tools—event interviews hold significant potential for application across a wide range of social research contexts, from economic vulnerability to life transitions and beyond. The pay-off is high: by embracing the complexity and reflexivity inherent to the tool, researchers can gain deeper insights while remaining attentive to the ethical and methodological challenges that arise. The combination of verbal and visual methods enabled participants to discuss highly sensitive and personal topics in ways that felt meaningful and manageable to them.

Ethical considerations were central to the project design. The workshops and community activities offered at the end of the project provided a space for reciprocity, reinforcing the ethical commitment to the communities involved. These practices underline the importance of designing research that not only collects data but also gives something tangible back to participants and their communities.

Finally, the dual-method approach enhanced the richness of the data but required significant time and effort in both data collection and analysis. The integration of verbal and visual data necessitated a multi-layered coding process that was resource-intensive. Future studies might consider refining tools or frameworks for analysing visual data to streamline this process without compromising depth.

Conclusion

This article has demonstrated the potential of event interviews as a valuable tool for understanding how families navigate economic challenges and adapt to critical events. By combining graphic timelines with semi-structured interviews, the method offers a unique lens through which to explore the interplay of individual agency, structural constraints, and the accumulation of disadvantage over time. It allows participants to reflect on their experiences and articulate the connections between events, shedding light on both the immediate strategies families use to manage economic shocks and the broader processes that shape vulnerability and resilience.

The findings underscore the versatility and richness of the method. Event interviews proved effective not only in capturing specific turning points, such as job losses, evictions, or health crises, but also in revealing how these moments are embedded within longer-term trajectories of economic precarity and cumulative disadvantage. This dual capacity to explore both acute shocks and chronic processes highlights the method’s potential for application beyond the study of financial vulnerability. It could be used to investigate a wide range of life transitions and adaptive responses, from changes in caregiving arrangements to the aftermath of relational disruptions or crises in mental health.

At the same time, the study identifies key factors that influence the quality and depth of data obtained through event interviews. Circumstantial elements, such as the context of the interview and the time available, as well as participant characteristics like literacy, language proficiency, and cultural background, all shaped the richness of the timelines and narratives. Addressing these challenges by creating more inclusive and flexible tools is essential to maximize the method’s effectiveness across diverse populations. Similarly, the variability in how participants documented events highlights the need for clearer guidelines and standardization to enable more systematic comparisons across cases. The balance between standardization and individualisation is to be negotiated on a case-by-case basis. In our study, the granting of flexibility to participants sought to prioritise participant’s own understanding of their experiences, as we were interested on how such understandings shaped their choices and behaviours.

We argue that the combination of visual timelines and narrative interviews provides a deeper understanding of participants’ experiences, illuminating dimensions of vulnerability and agency that might be overlooked in purely narrative or purely quantitative approaches (Rodó-Zárate, 2021). The process of digitizing the timelines further enhances their analytical potential, allowing researchers to identify patterns and connections that enrich the interpretative process.

In addition to its effectiveness for studying responses to financial shocks, the versatility of event interviews suggests potential applications in other areas of social research. The method could be used to explore how individuals and families adapt to a wide range of life events, such as entering cohabitation, coping with chronic illness, or reorganizing childcare in response to changing circumstances. It is equally well-suited to studying acute challenges, such as responding to aggression or chronic processes like navigating long-term caregiving responsibilities. Equally, while we have focused on the personal, event interviews can also help map how people and communities cope with local or global issues such as the closing of a factory or climate change.

By capturing both critical turning points and sustained processes of adaptation, event interviews provide a comprehensive understanding of resilience and problem-solving strategies in diverse contexts. Moreover, the insights generated by this approach have practical relevance for policy and intervention design, as they provide a grounded understanding of the strategies families employ and the structural constraints they face.

In conclusion, event interviews represent a significant step forward in qualitative research methodology. They provide a nuanced and adaptable approach to studying the dynamics of change, adaptation, and resilience in complex social contexts. While challenges remain—particularly in ensuring inclusivity and standardization—they constitute a useful tool for the study of change and adaptation. By building on the lessons learned from this study and continuing to refine the approach, future research can further enhance its utility and expand its application to new fields of inquiry.