Content Analysis of 51 Stillbirth Memento Photographs

Research into stillbirth memento photography shows the practice to be welcomed by the bereaved. The visual attributes and content of stillbirth memento photographs are yet to be rigorously analysed however, representing a significant gap in current understanding. This study seeks to address this. 51 professionally produced stillbirth memento photographs have been sampled, anonymised and analysed. Using a content analysis methodology, imagery was characterised by aesthetic and semantic properties. The content analysis identified four distinctive image tropes in the sample: images of mother, father and baby, with the baby being held and the parents touching; macro photography of the baby; portrait photographs of babies lying alone with little or no physical trauma evident; and images of a parent, usually the mother, cradling the baby.

The focus of the study is on the imagery produced by professional photographers for the bereaved following the death of their baby. The study seeks to measure and evaluate the content of these photographs. Primary data has been drawn from publicly available photographs that were published on websites and social media. Imagery has been collated from a range of sources to ensure the sample is representative and not the product of one photographer or of a specific charity’s guidelines (such as Remember My Baby). Imagery has only been used where explicit consent for publication was listed. The imagery is not reproduced and has been anonymised, but is available to access via hyperlinks in the results database.

The semantic analysis of this study seeks to measure who was included in the photographs, in terms of their relationship to the baby, and how they engage with one another (and the camera) as expressed through position, gesture, proximity and gaze. This coding is designed to identify inferred social relationships, as measured through the frequency and correlation of visual markers and motifs associated with familial and social identity.

Aesthetic attributes have been categorised according to visual qualities specific to photography. These relate to what is included or excluded from the image, point of view, how closely the main subject is cropped, image format, exposure length, the application of blur and sharpness within the image as a result of depth of field and colour saturation. The delineation of aesthetic attributes and semantic content is, on occasion, arbitrary and there is inevitably cross over; the background, for example, is an aesthetic property of the photograph, but is also rich with semantic information. As a result, the coding used reflects some rationalisation of aesthetic and semantic criteria.

对胎儿死亡纪念摄影的研究表明，该实践得到了丧亲者的普遍欢迎。然而，胎儿死亡纪念摄影的视觉属性和内容尚未经过严谨的分析，这构成了当前理解中的一个重大空白。本研究旨在填补这一空白。通过对51张由专业人士制作的胎儿死亡纪念照片进行抽样、匿名化和分析，本研究运用内容分析方法，对图像进行了美学和语义特性的刻画。内容分析在样本中识别出四种独特的图像类型：母亲、父亲和婴儿的图像，婴儿被抱在怀中，父母相互触摸；婴儿的特写摄影；婴儿独自躺着的肖像照片，几乎或完全没有明显的身体创伤；以及通常由母亲怀抱婴儿的图像。研究重点在于专业摄影师为丧亲者拍摄的图像，旨在衡量和评估这些照片的内容。主要数据来源于公开可获得的、已在网站和社交媒体上发布的照片。为了确保样本具有代表性，而非单一摄影师或特定慈善机构（如“记住我的宝宝”）指南的产物，图像来自多个来源。仅在明确列出发布同意的情况下使用图像。图像未进行复制，已进行匿名化处理，但可通过结果数据库中的超链接访问。本研究的语义分析旨在衡量照片中包含的人物，以及他们如何通过位置、姿态、接近度和目光等表达方式相互互动（以及与相机的互动）。这种编码旨在通过与家族和社会身份相关的视觉标记和图式的频率和相关性来识别推断出的社会关系。美学属性根据摄影特有的视觉质量进行分类。这些与图像中包含或排除的内容、视角、主体裁剪的紧密程度、图像格式、曝光时长、由于景深和色彩饱和度而产生的图像中的模糊和清晰度有关。美学属性和语义内容的划分有时是任意的，不可避免地存在交叉；例如，背景是照片的美学属性，但也蕴含着丰富的语义信息。因此，所使用的编码反映了美学和语义标准的某种合理化。