Ethnography section

Aim of interviews

to understand why people behave, case oriented and aim to go in depth

Aim of surveys

to measure how people behave, variable oriented an aim to generalize

Strengths of interviews

understand culture/value/meanings, understand events and their interpretation, probe further into assumptions made by quantitative studies

Individual face to face interviews

best for open ended questions, good for follow up questions, good for picking up body language/vocal cues

Telephone interviews

gives researcher ability to gather info quickly, wide geographical access, cannot see body language, can make people more comfortable

Online interviews

less personal, useful in small scale studies in combination with other tools, quick and easy to reach geographically dispersed interviewees

Email/chat interviews

less detailed, can be synchronous or asynchronous

Structured interviews

closed and simple questions, asked in a sequence to eliminate interview bias, used mostly in surveys

Unstructured interviews

open and more complex questions, can vary in the order of questions, no set structure and can allow more flexibility

Semi-structured interviews

order of questions can vary, some factual some probing questions, questions can be more general, can provide more valid data, not easy to compare answers

Focus groups

members can provoke others to consider their own views, can also deter people from speaking freely, the researcher is more of a mediator than interviewer

Ethical considerations for interviews

informed consent, confidentiality, avoid bias, risk of causing harm to participants regarded unacceptable

Bias as a problem in interviews

threat to validity, interview effect (more social acceptable answer), prejudices of interviewer

Analysis of interview data

reducing the data, coding the transcription, drawing conclusions

Thematic coding

age, country, coding is not just labelling but connecting and linking words/segments - create themes by combining similar codes

Why use participant observation?

observes what people act not just talk, more reliable than a one off interview, gives reliable representation of how people behave

How to do a participant observation

being approachable, choosing an acceptable site, write notes as detailed as possible

Ethical considerations in participant observations

signatures for consent, covert observation can reduce the researcher affecting participant behaviour