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Week 3: Qualitative

Research Methods

Qualitative Research Methods

Learning Objectives

· To introduce students to the main concepts related to qualitative research

· To gain an understanding of the main methods of qualitative data collection

· To introduce the ethical considerations and other related to qualitative research particularly

1.1 Introduction to Qualitative research methods

Qualitative research is a form of social inquiry that focuses on the way people interpret and make sense of their experiences and the world in which they live.” (Holloway, 1997, p.2).

"Qualitative" is an umbrella term used for a wide range of methods that have always been widely used by modern social sciences. These ways of investigating and analysing social aspects of life, in business and in other sectors are useful for all fields of international research, whether at the level or individuals, organisations or groups, during periods of routine or crisis, and regarding past or present times. This know-how can be of great use in many professional settings, beyond academic research, including: business organisations, profit and non-profit organisations, expertise and consultancy at local, national and international levels, education settings and more generally any position necessitating a deep understanding of social phenomena.

1.2 Investigating a research problem:

When we are investigating a social phenomenon, we problem . In order to examine it, we need to design a the research questions .

are interested in examining a research qualitative research study and address

For instance:

Ø Research problem:

Every year, students following compulsory research training units on the MSc in Research Methods online programme come from a wide range of backgrounds – from different countries; different education systems; and different professional backgrounds.

Recently many students from non-European countries join the course. Course tutors on the MSc need to be able to tailor their teaching to meet the needs and expectations of this diverse group. This makes it important to research new students’ backgrounds, their motivations for joining the MSc, and what they hope to get out of the programme.

To do so, the following research questions need to be addressed:

· Why do students choose to study for the MSc in Research Methods through the online programme?

· What do students hope to get out of the programme?

· What backgrounds do students come from?

Ø Designing your own qualitative study

Considering the above research problem here are some things you might want to think about

before you design your own qualitative study:

· What, specifically, do you want to find out from the students?

· What methods could you use to generate this data?

· How will you chose which students to involve?

· How will you make sure the students you involve can tell you the things which are most important to them?

· What problems might you encounter?

1.3 Qualitative methods of data collection

a) Interviews

The interview is a flexible tool for data collection, enabling multi-sensory channels to be used such as verbal, non-verbal, spoken and heard (Cohen, Manion & Morrison, 2013).

Interviewing is about creating a dynamic situation where you can access information which is not otherwise available and which illuminates your research questions.

· Why interview?

The purposes of the interview in the wider context of life are varied (Examples below):

· To evaluate or assess a person in some respect

· To select or promote an employee

· To effect therapeutic change, e.g a psychiatric interview

· To test or develop hypotheses

· To gather data, as in surveys or experimental situations

· To sample respondents’ opinions

As a distinctive research technique, the interview serves three main purposes:

1) To be used as the principal means of collecting information having direct bearing on the research objectives.

2) To be used to test hypotheses or to suggest new ones or as an explanatory device to help identify variables and relationships.

3) The interview to be used in conjunction with other methods in a research undertaking

(Cohen et al., 2007, p.351)

· Planning interview-based research procedures:

a) Designing an interview schedule

Before the actual interview

b) Setting up an interview

– A few practical and ethical considerations

c) Conducting an interview

– What’s it like being interviewed? Feedback from our interviewees

– Comparing our experiences as interviewers

– Listening to interviews: what issues are raised?

Your role as an interviewer:

· Learner & listener

non judgmental

· Facilitator & manager

It’s your job to:

manage the interview

make the interview a positive experience for the interviewee

Structuring your Interview

· Questions

clear, simple, non-leading, open

Finding an easy way in

general to the specific and vice versa

· Schedules and Interview guides

Example 1: Excerpt from a semi-structured interview schedule

· Questions can be prepared ahead of time

· Open-ended questions encourage communication

· Participants express their views in their own terms

· Provides a clear set of instructions

· reliable, comparable qualitative data

Semi-Structured Interviews

· Formal interview

· Follows an 'interview guide.‘

· List of questions and topics that need to be covered.

· Identified from prior research or unstructured interview or focus groups

· Questions are open-ended

· Flexible

· Interviewer can follow-up interesting points made

· Even if they deviate from guide

Topic: Government sponsored study

Fred: it’s a regeneration area and obviously we’ve got to knock some houses down in order to build some ones to regenerate the area and one of the residents who was a lady said everybody else seems to be getting everything and we’re getting nothing. Well outside there is a brand new Learning Centre and she said that’s not for us. You’re going to move us out and move new people in and they’ll get the benefit of that new Learning Centre.

Mel: It’s too good for us you mean?

Fred: No I think, well yes in a sense I think she was saying that, but I also think in another way what she was saying was that you decided it’s not for us because you’re knocking our houses down and you’re moving us somewhere else and you’re bringing new people and you’re bringing new people on who have got jobs and got money and that’s for them, not for our kids.

Example 2:

Topic: What your ITT programme involves and why

Q1. Can you tell me about the way your ITT programme is designed?

Prompts (if necessary)

· What are the key activities trainees engage in and how is their time spent in different tasks/locations?

· Who are the different people involved with the trainees’ programme and how are they involved?

Q2. (If not mentioned above) Can you talk about why the programme has been designed in this way?

Prompts (if necessary)

· Are there any principles or other underlying ideals guiding the programme design?

· Are there any practical influences/shapers? {funding constraints, staff/trainee retention, requirements of Standards}

· {Unpack what interviewee means by theory and practice if they refer to these concepts}

Q3. Do you have any ideas about how the programme might develop in the future?

Prompts (if necessary)

· (If applicable) are any of these plans presently in motion?

· (If applicable) what might help or hinder the development of these plans?

Ethical considerations

Putting your interviewee first

Confidentiality

Permission to record

Creating a suitable environment

Friendly seating

Encouragement (&management) through body language

b) Focus Group Interview

What is focus group interview (FGI)?

“A research technique which allows the collection of qualitative data through group interaction, on a topic determined by the researcher” (Morgan, 1996).

“The dialogic nature of the Focus Group Discussions allows the co-construction of meaning between the different interviewees on the topic investigated” (Overlien, 2005)

Why focus groups interviews?

· Useful methodology in exploring and examining what people think, how they think, and why they think the way they think about the issues of importance. No pressure to them into making decisions or reaching a consensus.

· “ideal” approach for examining the stories, experiences, points of views, beliefs of individuals.

· The participants can develop their own questions and frameworks and seek their own needs

· The research can access different communication forms which people use to their

everyday life (joking, teasing etc.) à gain access to diverse forms of communication à valuable as it may not be possible or difficult to capture the knowledge of individuals by asking them to respond to more direct questions such as in surveys and

questionnaires.

· Focus groups permit researchers to enter the world of participants which other research methods may not be able to do.

· Focus group discover how “accounts are articulated, opposed and changed through social interaction and how this relates to peer communication and group norms”

· Offer the researchers a means of obtaining an understanding (insight) of a wide range of views that people have about a specific issue and how they interact and discuss the issue (eg in the paper p.5).

· A focus group interview is useful when the research does not have a depth of knowledge about the participants (thoughts, feelings, understandings, perceptions and impressions of people in their own words).

· Obtaining in-depth understanding of the numerous interpretations of a particular issue of the research participants.

· Particularly suitable for exploring issues “where complex patterns of behaviour and motivation are evident, where diverse views are held”

· Explore the gap between what people say and what they do.

· Ideal for many people from ethic minority group.

· FGI as a basis for empowering marginalised people.

· Ability to cultivate people’s responses to events as they involve.

(Liamputtong, 2011)

When do we use FGI?

· Exploratory phase – opening up issues

· Main phase

· as an alternative to interviews

· as a precursor to interviews

· Testing findings (especially implications)

Advantages of focus group methodology:

Some criticism about the focus group

methodology:

· Researchers are provided with a great

· Focus group discussions may not be

opportunity to appreciate

the way

sufficiently in depth to allow the

people see their own reality

à they get

closer to data

researchers to gain a good

understanding of the participants’

experiences.

·

Intended

individuals

and

groups

à

· The participants may not actively

more

people

are

involved

in

the

take part in group discussions.

research projectà the research will

meet their needs.

·

Enables

in

–depth

discussions and

· Some research topics are unsuitable

involves

a

relatively small

number

of

for focus group environments (such

people.

as living with HIV/AIDS). Such

interviews can be carried out by other

methods (personal interviews).

· Focused on a specific area of interest

· The quality of data generated will be

à allows participants to

discuss

the

affected by the characteristics and

topic in greater detail

context of the focus group.

· Group

processes assist people to

· Certain personalities (such as

explore and clarify their points of view

dominant) may influence the group

à the “group effect”

discussion.

· There

is a moderator, researcher that

· Personal info and experience may not

guides

and

assists

the participants

to

be discussed.

discuss

the

topic.

Encourages

interaction and guides conversation.

·

Moderator

à obtaining good and

· Criticised for offering a shallower

accurate info from the focus group à

understanding of an issues than those

crucial role. Can be more than one

moderator in one FG.

obtained from individual interviews.

· The participants can share social and

· In institutional workplaces

cultural

experiences

(age,

gender,

(workplace or schools) people may

educational background) or other areas

of concern (divorce, marriage etc)

be reluctant to express their opinions

or discuss their personal experiences

in front of their colleagues.

Virtual Focus Groups :

· Reduction of costs and time of research fieldwork

· Feasibility of bringing together individuals who are located in geographically dispersed areas

· Availability of a complete record of the discussion without the need of transcription

· Anonymity secured by the research setting

Issues to consider in focus groups:

Group size (6-10 individuals)

· Group composition (homogeneous vs. heterogeneous groups)

· Discussion schedule with appropriate questions

· Methods of data recording (difficult to rely only on field-notes; consent for tape recording)

· Ethics (consent forms; anonymity; confidentiality of results)

· Rules of engagement

· Role of the group moderator (personal and leadership skills; setting rules of engagement) (Liamputtong, 2011)

c) Using observations

Why do I want to observe?

· “The distinctive feature of observation as a research process is that it offers the investigator the opportunity to gather ‘live’ data from naturally occurring social situations. In this way the researcher can look directly at what is taking place in situ rather than relying on second-hand accounts” (Cohen et al., 2007, p. 397).

· What people do differ from what they say they do and observation provides a reality check (Robson, 2002, p. 310)

When doing observations . . .

· Do I want to look, or listen, or hear or both?

· Do I want to observe in real time, or later, or both?

– If in real time, do I record on paper or electronically?

– If later, do I capture events by voice recorder, or video, or stills camera, or in text (e.g. chat rooms)

· Do I want to observe continuously, or for fixed periods, or at fixed intervals?

· Do I want to observe the whole arena, or just part of it?

· Do I want to the same events/people all the time, or to change?

· Do I want to do the observation myself or involve others?

Diagram 1: Decisions involved when conducting research using observations

Developing a focus:

LeCompte and Preissle (1993, p. 199-200) provide a useful set of guidelines for directing observations of specific activities, events or scenes and they suggest that they should include answers to the following questions:

· What sorts of events do I want to observe? Do I know:

– Precisely? Can I develop a set of codes to categorise events?

– To some extent? Can I specify the types of event but not the detailed events?

– Only in general terms? Do I have a broad focus, but little idea what will happen in detail?

· Is my main focus:

– What happens?

– When it happens (how often, in what sequence)?

– Who is involved?

– Some combination?

· What matters most:

– Quantification?

– Description?

· Do I want to/can I be:

– Completely out of the picture (e.g. behind a screen)?

– Present but not participating?

– Present, participating & recording?

– Present, fully involved, & not recording?

· What is the impact of my role on events?

· What are the ethical implications of my role?

· What aspects of context do I need to record:

– Who’s present?

– What they are there for?

– Where people/objects are?

– How people move?

– What time it is?

– How long the observation lasts?

– What changes?

– What happens before/after?

· Field notes

– Record what is important in the light of a ‘sensitising framework’

– Rely heavily on the observer’s sensitivity

· Semi-structured schedules

– Tight-loose structure, e.g.:

· broad categories tight – detailed description loose

· timing tight – focus loose

· Structured schedules

– Tight structure, especially for coding events

– Systematic and enables the researcher to generate numerical data from the observations and they can facilitate to make comparisons between settings and situations. The observer adopts a passive, non-intrusive role (Cohen et al., 2007)

Further reading:

Boyce, C. and Neale, P., (2006). Conducting in-depth interviews: A guide for designing and conducting in-depth interviews for evaluation input.

Doody, O., & Noonan, M. (2013). Preparing and conducting interviews to collect data. Nurse researcher, 20, 28-32.

Fereday, J. and Muir-Cochrane, E., (2006). Demonstrating rigor using thematic analysis: A hybrid approach of inductive and deductive coding and theme development. International journal of qualitative methods, 5(1), pp.80-92.

Jacob, S. A., & Furgerson, S. P. (2012). Writing interview protocols and conducting interviews: Tips for students new to the field of qualitative research. The Qualitative Report,

17, 1-10.

Kitzinger, J. (1994). The methodology of focus groups: the importance of interaction between research participants. Sociology of health & illness, 16(1), 103-121.

Kitzinger, J. (1995). Qualitative research. Introducing focus groups. BMJ: British medical journal, 311, 299.

Liamputtong, P. (2011). Focus group methodology: Principle and practice. Sage Publications.

Smithson, J. (2000). Using and analysing focus groups: limitations and possibilities.

International journal of social research methodology, 3, 103-119.

Videos:

Fundamentals of Qualitative Research: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbdN_sLWl8 8

References:

Cohen, L., Manion, L. and Morrison, K., (2007). Research methods in education. Routledge.

LeCrompte, M. and Preissle, J. (1993) Ethnography and Qualitative Design in Educational Research (second edition). London: Academic Press

Liamputtong, P. (2011). Focus group methodology: Principle and practice. Sage Publications.

Robson, C., (2002). Real world research. 2nd. Edition. Blackwell Publishing. Malden.