Qualitative Research

what do qualitative researchers do

they begin with a less focused research question, collect large amounts of data (unfiltered) from a small number of people using non statistical techniques

what does qualitative research try to understand

more about understanding human experience from others’ perspective instead of drawing general conclusions about human behavior

purpose of qualitative research

rich and detailed descriptions of human behavior in the real-world context that it occurs

• “thick description”

data collection and analysis in qualitative research

varied and involves naturalistic observation, participant observation, archival data, artwork and many other things

interviews

structured, unstructured, or semi structured

focus groups

small groups of people who participate together in interviews focused on a particular topic or issue; interactions between participants can bring out more info versus one on one

grounded theory

researcher starts with data and develops a theory or interpretation that is grounded in the data

• identify repeated ideas in data, then organize them in a small number of broader themes

theoretical narrative

interpretation of data in terms of themes they identified; focuses on subjective expereince of participants and is supported direct quotes of what the participant said

cons of qualitative research

• lack objectivity

• difficult to evaluate in terms of reliability and validity

• does not allow generalization to people or situations other than those actually studied

• there is a framework for addressing these issues

mixed methods research

combining qualitative and quantitative research

• ex: qualitative for hypothesis, quantitative for hypothesis testing

triangulation

use quantitative and qualitative research simultaneously to study the same general questions and compare the results; if results of qualittative and quantitative converge on the same general conclusion, they reinforce and enrich each other

structured interviews

same questions to everyone

semi-structured

same questions, but follow up on the themes that arose

unstructured interviews

free flowing with no questions in advance

thematic analysis

pull out themes from interviews

types of thematic analysis

• with pre-existing theory

• without pre-existing theory

thematic analysis with pre existing theory

already have an idea of themes and will look for those specific themes

thematic analysis without pre existing theory

don’t know what you’re going to find, so you let the data dictate the themes, rather than the other way around

grounded theory

related to thematic analysis

• go in with question and create theory as you go though analysis based on data

ethnography

• time consuming

• identify a community of interest and embed yourself in that community

phenomenology

study of appearances

• based in description

• staying close to lived experience

• what is x like