Qualitative Research Methods Review

Flashcards on Qualitative Research Methods

What is the primary aim of qualitative research?

To understand the meaning and experience dimensions of human lives and social worlds.

Which disciplines do qualitative research methods originate from?

Anthropology, sociology, and psychology.

What are the three main areas that qualitative research questions focus on?

Language as communication, interpretation of subjective meanings, and theory-building through qualitative data.

Which paradigm does qualitative research typically follow?

A social constructivist and interpretivist paradigm.

List five characteristics of qualitative research.

Non-numerical data, emergent design, inductive, interpretative, and multiple sources of data.

What is the general focus of research questions in qualitative research?

Exploring experiences and representations of individuals.

Name seven basic types of qualitative study designs.

Basic Interpretative Study, Phenomenology, Grounded Theory, Case Study, Ethnographic study, Narrative Research, and Critical qualitative research.

What is the aim of a basic interpretative study?

To understand how participants make meaning of a situation or phenomenon.

What is Phenomenology?

A qualitative research approach that describes the lived experiences of an individual focusing on studying the phenomena that have impacted an individual.

What is the main goal of grounded theory?

To discover or construct theory from data, systematically obtained and analyzed using comparative analysis.

Describe a Case Study.

An intensive description and analysis of one single phenomenon or a unit.

What is the aim of an ethnographic study?

To produce a rich, comprehensive account of a social setting from the participants’ point of view, with a sociocultural interpretation of data.

What is Narrative Research?

A story linking events in a chronological fashion, interpreting what we and others do and produced during social interaction.

What does critical qualitative research aim to uncover?

The social, cultural, and psychological assumptions that structure and limit our ways of thinking and being in the world.

Name three basic methods of data collection in qualitative research.

Individual Based Methods, Group Based Methods, and Document based methods.

What is the role of the interviewer in qualitative interviewing?

To ask questions and probes designed to encourage the interviewee to talk freely and extensively about the topic(s) defined by the researcher.

What are the three types of interviews?

Unstructured, semi-structured and structured.

What is a focus group discussion?

A collective interview, directed by a moderator, which exploits the interactive potential to generate rich data.

Name three approaches to the use of focus groups.

The exploratory, the clinical, and the phenomenological.

What is Participant Observation?

The recording and analysing of the researcher’s observations when closely immersed in a group or culture.

What is triangulation in qualitative research?

The use of multiple methods or data sources in qualitative research to develop a comprehensive understanding of phenomena.

Name four types of triangulation.

Method Triangulation, Investigator Triangulation, Theory Triangulation, and Data source triangulation

What is methods triangulation?

Methods triangulation is the use of multiple methods to study a situation or phenomenon.

What is investigator triangulation?

Investigator triangulation is the use of more than one investigator, interviewer, observer, researcher or data analyst in a study.

What is theory triangulation?

Theory triangulation is the use of multiple theories or hypotheses when examining a situation or phenomenon.

Name some types of qualitative data analysis.

Thematic Analysis, Narrative Analysis, Content Analysis, Discourse analysis, Grounded Theory and Interpretative phenomenological Analysis

Name three mixed method study designs.

Sequential Explanatory Research Design, Sequential Exploratory Research Design, and Convergent Research design.