I can only respond to this point from my experience as a designer, so cannot ignore my bias as someone who privileges visual material. But…
Even when I write a paper (that takes me weeks) and I include a diagram (that takes an hour to design) I often feel that the diagram resonates more with the [...]
After personally valuing the process I soon began to encourage communication design research students to draw the scope of their research projects—as a reflective process for them and a comprehension exercise for me. Soon after I began to set assignments where they would draw, for example, their literary review or develop visual metaphors for their [...]
In part this topic has evolved from observing my own research practice over the first year of my PhD. It soon became apparent that I would usually turn up with maps and diagrams to talk over my progress with my supervisors—as opposed to written notes. I often felt that my ability to translate these ideas [...]