Qualitative Research
- For this discussion, section find two peer-reviewed academic journal articles that directly relate to your research topic that uses qualitative analysis [Chapters 10 & 11]. [While the book focuses on ethnography and focus groups, the qualitative analysis also includes content analysis, in-depth interviews, and discourse analysis among others.]
- Describe the details of the qualitative analysis [enough to give a reader a sense of the time, effort, and artifacts involved].
- Describe how these articles provide add value to your topic because of their qualitative methodology.
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Observing People in Natural Setting
Chapter 10
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What is Field Research?
Field research produces qualitative data.
Field researchers directly observe and participate in a natural social setting.
There are several kinds of field research:
ethnography
participant-observation research
informal “depth” interviews
focus groups
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What is Field Research?
Ethnography = A detailed description of insider meanings and cultural knowledge of living cultures in natural settings.
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Studying People in the Field
Naturalism = The principle that we learn best by observing ordinary events in a natural setting, not in a contrived, invented, or researcher-created setting
Preparing for a Field Study
Increasing Self Awareness
Conducting Background Investigation
Practice observing and writing
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Studying People in the Field
Starting the Research Project
Getting Organized.
Selecting a Field Site
Field Site = Any location or set of locations in which field research takes place. It usually has on-going social interaction and a shared culture.
Containment
Richness
Unfamiliarity
Suitability
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Studying People in the Field
Starting the Research Project
Gaining Access
Gatekeeper = Someone with the formal or informal authority to control access to a field site.
Entering the Field
Presentation of self
Disclosure
Social Roles
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Studying People in the Field
Being in the Field
Learning the Ropes.
Normalizing Social Research
Normalize = How a field researcher helps field site members redefine social research from unknown and potentially threatening to something normal, comfortable and familiar.
Building Rapport and Trust.
Negotiating continuously
Deciding a degree of Involvement
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Studying People in the Field
Strategies for Success in the Field
Building relationships
Performing small favors
Appearing interested and exercising selective inattention
Appearance of interest = A micro strategy to build or maintain relationships in which a researcher acts interested even when he or she is actually bored and uninterested.
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Studying People in the Field
Strategies for Success in the Field
Being an earnest novice
Avoiding Conflicts
Adopting an Attitude of Strangeness
Attitude of Strangeness = A perspective in which the field researcher questions and notices ordinary details by looking at the ordinary through the eyes of a stranger.
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Studying People in the Field
Observing and Collecting Data
The Researcher is a Data Collection Instrument
What to Observe
Physical appearance
People and their behavior
People’s actions
The context in which events occur
Exactly what people say
When “Nothing” Happens.
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Studying People in the Field
Observing and Collecting Data
Sampling
observations from all possible times, locations, people, situations, types of events, or contexts of interest.
sample three types of field site events: routine, special, and unanticipated.
Routine
Special
Unanticipated
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Studying People in the Field
Observing and Collecting Data
Becoming a Skillful Note-Taker
Types of Notes
Jotted notes = Optional very short notes of a few words written very inconspicuously in the field site that are only to trigger memory later.
Supplements
How to take notes
Maps and diagrams
Recordings to Supplement Memory.
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Studying People in the Field
Interviewing in Field Research
Types of Questions in Field Interviews
Descriptive Questions
Structural Questions
Contrast Questions
Informant = A member in a field site with whom a researcher develops a relationship, and who tells the researcher many details about life in the field state.
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Studying People in the Field
Leaving the Field
exiting can be disruptive or emotionally painful
depends on specifics of the field setting and relationships developed
Writing the Field Research Report
start to think about what will appear in a report while still gathering data
book-length or long descriptive articles
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Ethics and the Field Researcher
Privacy is the most common ethical issue.
Confidentiality must be maintained.
Personal risk potential.
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Focus Groups
Focus Group = A qualitative research technique that involves informal group interviews about a topic.
Advantages
Limitations
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Focus Groups
Advantages:
fast, easy to do, and inexpensive
natural setting helps to increase external validity
provides new insights and ideas for questions and answer categories
gives a window into how people naturally discuss topics
allows participants to query one another and explain their answers to each others
encourages open expression among members of marginalized social groups
helps people feel empowered by a group setting
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Focus Groups
Limitations
cannot generalize discussion outcomes to large, diverse population
creates group “polarization effect”
limited to discussing one or a few topics per session
moderator may unknowingly limit full, open, and free expression
participants tend to produce fewer ideas than in individual interviews
large quantity of results can be difficult to analyze
rarely report all details of study design/procedure
difficult to reconcile differences between responses given by individual-only interview and those from a focus group
