Adapted from Chambers (1992).

Each team will choose the methods which are more appropriate in their field context to efficiently generate the kinds of information required to define and describe the components of adaptive strategies and sustainable livelihoods. Most of the methods are content-neutral and may be applied to different subjects. It is strongly emphasized that these are not exercises to be undertaken with community members so much as representations may allow community members to communicate information of a much more complex nature than is normally possible in a purely verbal medium. Creativity, spontaneity and imagination are valuable in adapting existing representations and in developing new ones. It is important that researchers should not inhibit informants by trying to impose their own prior conceptions of what a representation should look like, its orientation, or composition.

The process of preparing the representation - the discussions or arguments which ensue - can be as illuminating as the final product. Researchers will find it better to interrogate the representation than to interrogate its makers.

It is important to triangulate important information, i.e., verify or validate it against that obtained from other sources or methods.

The representation is the property of the people who made it, not the researcher.

Any paper reproduction should say who made it, where, and when. Annotations of process and comments are also useful.