NRES 340 - Exam 2

five features of qualitative research

o   Studying the meaning of people’s lives

o   Representing the views of people

o   Covering contextual conditions

o   Contributing insights to concepts that explain social behavior

o   Striving to use multiple sources of evidence

interview data collection method

language (verbal and body)

observing data collection method

people’s gestures, social interactions, actions, and the physical environment

collecting and examining data collection method

contents of personal documents, other printed materials, graphics, archival records, and physical artifacts

feeling data collection method

sensations

validity

Conclusions accurately reflect and represent the real context that was studied, if you went back to the people you interviewed and asked if the study reflects their experiences, they would say yes

reliability

instruments and interpretations are documented and consistent

strategies to combat threats to validity (7)

o   Long-term engagement (opportunity for repeated observations)

o   Rich data (detailed and comprehensive)

o   Respondent validation (feedback to less misrepresentation)

o   Search for discrepancies or negative cases

o   Triangulation (use different sources of information for different data)

o   Quasi-statistics (use numbers when possible)

o   Comparison (compare findings across different places or groups)

analytic generalization

o   cannot generalize the characteristics of a population with qualitative research

• Instead, inform conceptual claims

  • then describe similar situations where the finding about conceptual claim may be relevant and provide lessons or a new way of thinking about the concept

emic

o   capture participants’ internal meanings and experiences with an event

etic

o   imposes external perspective to interpret an event

ethnography

involves a field-based study lengthy enough to surface people’s everyday norms, rituals, and routines in detail

Recall Seth Holmes’ study of migrant farmworkers in terms of how it illustrates the strengths of ethnographic methods

Allowed him to develop a full understanding of hardships the migrants experienced, including physical, mental, and emotional challenges

complete participant observation

researchers who study contexts in which they are already members or to which they become fully affiliated

play participant observation

watch and do what others are doing not merely to gain acceptance, but to more fully learn the culture rules for behavior

focused witness observation

enters a scene with an explicit and clear agenda of the topics they are interested in studying, the people they want to interact with, and the time period they will be active in the scene

complete witness observation

stand at periphery, research is usually covert and participants do not know they are being studied

purpose of field notes

help with recording and making sense of data via textual and visual domain for later research reports

interviews

guided question-answer conversations, or an interchange of view between two persons conversing about a theme or mutual interest

value of interviews (4)

●      Opportunity for mutual discovery

●      Understanding

●      Reflection

●      Explanation via an organic and adaptive path

structured interviews

may be due to being short on time, you don’t want to get a set of emergent themes, close-ended research questions

semi-structured interviews

adaptive; if something unanticipated comes up, you can explore emergent theme

deliberate naivete interview stance

position of little knowledge

pedagogical interview stance

learning and teaching

responsive interview stance

reciprocal—may be overarching of other stances

confrontational interview stance

deliberate provocation

best practices for wording interview questions (5)

o   Wording should be straightforward, neutral, and non-leading

o   Inquire about one thing at a time and be as specific as possible

o   Promote complex and open-ended answers

o   Accompanied by appropriate follow-ups and probes

o   Uphold rather than threat interviewees’ preferred identity

opening interview question type

informed consent, rapport building, experience, factual issues

generative interview question type

generate open discussion (tour, example, timeline, compare/contrast, etc.)

directive interview question type

direct the interviewee to particular answers (close-ended, typology, member reflections, etc.)

closing interview question type

catch-all, identity-enhancing, demographic, preferred pseudonym

purpose of focus groups

used when research could benefit from similar others coming together to chain ideas off one another or work toward emergent solutions

benefits of focus groups

• Group effect can produce more ideas as participants share and cascade off one another

  • Helps for everyone to have an experience/identity in common 

• Transformative when participants can learn from one another

saturation

when you can make sense of the data in terms of identifying areas of consensus or other patterns, and when collection more data produces little important new information

close-ended questions

limited and predefined answer options

open-ended questions

encourage detailed answers

phronetic interative qualitative analysis approach

alternative between emic and etic readings of the data

what phronetic interative qualitative analysis approach is NOT

grounded theory or post-positivist approach

organization in qualitative analysis

physically organize data by chronology, type of data, or attribute

data immersion in qualitative analysis

engage with data in multiple ways (organize, read transcripts, write memos, talk to colleagues)

primary coding in qualitative analysis

first pass through data, codes focus on what is present in the data

codebook creation in qualitative analysis

axial coding—assembling codes into umbrella categories

secondary coding in qualitative analysis

critically examine first cycle codes and organize into interpretive concepts

questions to ask during synthesis in qualitative analysis

additional data collection? Saturated analysis?

last step in qualitative analysis

transition to writing

primary cycle vs secondary cycle coding

• primary: is a first pass through the data, focus only on what is present, in-vivo codes (in their own words)

• secondary: critically examines first cycle codes and organizes them into interpretative concepts, organize parent and child codes

intercoder reliability

Level of agreement among different researchers when interpretating and classifying data

how to achieve intercoder reliability

clear, detailed codebook and frequent discussions among coders

code

words or short phrases that capture the essence of the theme that you are trying to identify within your data

coding

identifying which data belong to different codes

codebook

all parent and child codes

in vivo code

in interviewees’ own words

Jane Gross’s study topic and approach

o   Use an environmental justice lens to understand unequal access to soil organic carbon (SOC) markets

o   Interviewed farmers, found 1^st people through online survey

Alex Ramirez’s study topic and approach

o   Understand agroforestry perceptions and adoption decisions in IL

▪        Gets at the social aspect of agroforestry

o   Interview operators and program administrators found by internet searchers

▪        Chain referral for farmers

Guests’ justifications for using semi-structured interviews (5)

o   Rich details

o   Gets at the process

o   Individual perspectives

o   Allows the researcher to dive deeper

o   Gives individuals freedom to express their views

attributes for environmental justice-informed research

o   Prioritize considerate project design

▪        Use inclusive language in interview guide

▪        Make interviews accessible by scheduling at locations that are best for participants

▪        Compensate participants for their time and reimburse them for any travel

o   Practice reciprocity

o   Consider data access

▪        Findings were published in open-access journal