*

Talkie Time: Research worth Sharing

Lesson 8, competencies : The learner

The learner:
CS_RS11-IVa-c-1
1. chooses appropriate qualitative
research design

2. identify the variables addendum

*

Design Focus? Main Aim? How to gather Sample Size

Characteristics Assumptions the Data?
1. Biography
2. Ethnography
3. Phenomenology
4. Grounded Theory
5. Case Study

3
* Specify design before data collection
* Adhere to the design after study started
* Study design evolves over time
* Researcher Decisions include:
(a) How to obtain
(b) From whom to collect
(c) How to schedule
(d) How long

*
*EMERGENT DESIGN
*A design that emerges as the researcher makes ongoing decisions reflecting
what has already been learned

*Lincoln & Cuba (1985) – not researcher laziness or sloppiness – but rather
desire to base inquiry on realities and viewpoints of those under study
*Key: realities and viewpoints that are NOT KNOWN or UNDERSTOOD AT THE
OUTSET

*
Flexible, elastic, capable of adjusting
*Merging together of various data collection strategies
*Holistic, understand the whole
*Research intensely involved
*Research to become the research instrument
*Requires ongoing analysis of data to formulate subsequent strategies and to
determine when field work is done

What is “Bricolage?”

*
 Qualitative approaches on:
A. Literature review
B. Explicating researcher’s beliefs
C. Role of participants: subject or informant?
D. Selection of participants
E. Setting for data collection
F. Approach to data analysis
G. Saturation

© 2007 Pearson Education

6-7
Canada
 Qualitative Design Features
 Control over the (independent) variable

 Type of group comparisons

 Number of data collection points

 Occurrence of the (independent & dependent) variables

Variables – Characteristics or property whereby the members of the group set differ from one
another.

A. Independent Variables – “X variable or Response Variable”

- Characteristics or condition that is introduced, removed or manipulated to cause a change
in the dependent variable that is to be observed or measured.
- Predictor of Input

B. Dependent Variable – “Y variable or Outcome Variable”

- Characteristics or condition that is observed and measured to find out how the independent
variable affects it.
- (Outcome or attitude variable)

C. Z Variable – “Moderator Variable”

- Secondary independent variable that is included and measured in the study to determine
whether it affects, modify or alter the relation between the independent and dependent variable.
QUIZ :Identify the variables in the following titles and tell whether such variable
is independent or dependent:

1. Relationship between age and academic performance

2. Correlation between leadership skills and educational qualifications
3. The effects of light to the growth of mongo seeds.
4. Instructional media in relation to scores in quizzes
5. Personal satisfaction and job security
6. Love and Money
7. Success and Knowledge
8. Effects of attitude to grades in Math
9. Socio-economic status in relation to attendance in classroom
10. Teacher’s competence and passing rate of students
 Qualitative Research Designs: Closer Look

(1) Ethnography
(2) Phenomenology
(3) Grounded Theory
(4) Biography Research
(5) Case Study
 ETHNOGRAPHY
 Research tradition in anthropology
 Provides a framework for studying meanings, patterns, and experiences
defined by a cultural group in a holistic fashion

 Ethnoscience (Cognitive Anthropology): focuses on the cognitive world

of a culture – semantic rules and shared meanings that shape behavoir
 ETHNOGRAPHY
 Focus: the culture of a group of people
 Assumption: every human group evolves a culture that guides
members view of the world and the way they structure their experiences

 At times referred to as “macroethnography: - able to study broadly

defined cultures

 At times referred to as “microethnography” – able to study cultures

using a very narrow focus
 Ethnography Cont’d
 Aim: to learn from rather than study members of a cultural group

 Two perspectives:
(1) Emic – insider’s view, the way the members of a culture envision their
world
(2) Etic - outsiders’ interpretation of the experiences of that culture –
strive to get at cultural experiences that members do not talk about or
may not even be consciously aware
Ethnography Cont’d
 Extensive field work
 Typically labor intensive
 Time consuming

 Researcher as instrument - to study a culture it requires a certain level

of intimacy – needs to be developed – become one within the culture
Ethnography Cont’d
 Three types of information:
(1) Cultural behavoir
(2) Cultural artifacts
(3) Cultural speech

Sources of information – in-depth interviews, records, charts, observations

and other types of physical evidence are used
Ethnography Cont’d
 Products of this research includes:
- rich and holistic descriptions
- describe normative behavoir and social patterns
- Information about health beliefs and health practices
- Facilitates an understanding of behavoirs affecting health and illness
- Leininger coined the phrase:

“ethnonursing research” –the study and analysis of local or indigneous people’s

viewpoints, beliefs and practices about nursing care behavoir and processes of
designated cultures
 Phenomenology
 Phenomenology is both philosophy and a research method
 Purpose of this research method is to describe experiences as they are
lived – to capture the
“lived experience”

 Developed by Husserl & Heidegger – an approach to thinking about

people’s life experiences.
 Phenomenology Cont’d
Philosophical Orientation
- view the person as integral with the environment
- World is shaped by the self and also shapes the self
- The person is a self within a body
- Person is referred to as “embodied” – our bodies provide the possibility
for the concrete actions of self in the world
- The body, the world and the concerns, unique to each person, are the
“context” within which that person can be understood
- “being in time”
 Phenomenology Cont’d

 A phenomenological researcher asks the question:

“What is the essence of this phenomena as experienced by these people and
what does it mean?”

Assumption: there is an “essence”

an essential variant structure
 Investigates subjective phenomena

 Belief that truths about reality are grounded in peoples’ lived experiences
 Phenomenology Cont’d
 Two Schools of Thought:

(1) Descriptive phenomenology

(1) Interpretive phenomenology (hermeneutics)

 Phenomenology Cont’d
 Four aspects of the lived experience:

(1) SPATIALITY

(2) CORPOREALITY

(3) TEMPORALITY

(4) RELATIONALITY
 Phenomenology Cont’d
 Phenomenologists believe – human existence is “meaningful” and “interesting”
 “Being in the world” or “Embodiment” is a concept that acknowledges people’s
physical ties to their world
 People:
 THINK
 SEE
 HEAR
 FEEL
 CONCIOUS OF THEIR BODIES INTERACTION WITH THE WORLD
 Phenomenology Cont’d

 Data sources:
 In-depth conversations
 Researcher helps the participant to describe lived experiences without
leading the discussion
 Two or more interviews/conversations are needed
 Usually small number of participants (ie. 10 or less)
 May use participation, observation and introspective reflection
 Grounded Theory

 Is an inductive research technique developed for health-related topics by

Glaser & Strauss (1967)

 Emerged from the discipline of sociology

 “Grounded” – means the theory developed from the research is

grounded or has it roots in the data from which is was derived
 Grounded Theory Cont’d
 Philosophical Orientation:
 Based on symbolic interaction theory
 Explores how people define reality and how their beliefs are related to their
actions
 Meaning is expressed through – symbols – such as words, religious objects,
and clothing
 Symbolic meanings are different for each of us
 In social life - meanings are shared by groups – socialization process
 Group life is based on consensus and shared meanings
 Grounded Theory Cont’d

 Is an approach to study the social processes and social structures

 Focus: is the evolution of a social experience – the social and

psychological stages that characterize a particular event of process
 Grounded Theory Cont’d
 Methodology:
- does not begin with a focused research question
- the question emerges from the data

- fundamental structure feature –

 is the “data collection”
 is the “data analysis”
 Is the sampling of participants occurs simultaneously
 This procedure is referred to as “constant comparison”
 Grounded Theory Cont’d
 Constant Comparison: is used to develop and refine theoretically
relevant categories and to identify the basic problem
 Categories that are elicited from the data are constantly compared with
data obtained earlier so that “commonalities” and “variations” can be
determined
 Categories can be “condensed” and “collapsed”
 Grounded Theory Cont’d
 Data Sources:

- in-depth interviews are most common

- Observational methods
- Existing documents

- Usually a sample of 25 to 50 informants

- Has contributed to the development of middle range nursing theories

 What is Biographic or also called
narrative research?
• In narrative research, researchers describe
the lives of individuals, collect and tell stories
about people’s lives, and write narratives of
individual experiences.
• As a distinct form of qualitative research, a
narrative typically focuses on studying a
single person

Educational Research 2e: Creswell

 How do you use narrative designs?

• When individuals are willing to tell their stories

• Want to report personal experiences in a particular
setting
• Want a close bond with participants
• When participants want to process their stories
• When you have a chronology of events
• When you want to write in a literary way and develop
the micro picture

Educational Research 2e: Creswell

 Types of narrative designs: Questions
to ask
• Who writes or records the story?( e.g., Biography;
Autobiography)
• How much of a life is recorded or presented? (e.g., Life History;
Personal Experience Story)
• Who provides the story?
• Is a theoretical lens being used? (Ideology that provides
structure)
• When can narrative forms be combined? (e.g., Biography and
Personal Account)

Educational Research 2e: Creswell

Key characteristics Collecting
individual stories
• A story in narrative research is a first-person oral telling or
retelling of an individual
• Stories have a beginning, middle, and end
• Involve a predicament, conflict, or struggle; a protagonist or
character; and a sequence with implied causality (a plot)
during which the predicament is resolved in some fashion
• Like a novel, stories have time, place, plot, and scene
• Varied sources of data comprise the data base

Educational Research 2e: Creswell

Key characteristics: Restorying

• Restories the individual stories

– researcher gathers stories and analyzes them for elements
of the story
– researcher rewrites the story to place it in a chronological
sequence
– restorying provides a causal link among ideas
– information would include interaction, continuity, and
situation

Educational Research 2e: Creswell

 Potential issues in narrative research

• Story authentic? (“Faking the data” possible)

• Is the story “real?” (Participants may not be able to tell
the “real story”)
• Who “owns” the story? (Does the researcher have
permission to share it?)
• Is participant’s voice lost?
• Does the researcher gain at the expense of the
participant?

Educational Research 2e: Creswell

Steps in narrative research
Build in past, Build in place Describe their Analyze story
Present, future or setting story for
themes
Have them Collect other
Tell story Field texts
Restory or retell
The individual’s Collaborate with
Collect stories from story
the individual that participant storyteller in
Reflect personal experience all phases of research

Purposefully select an Write a story about the

individual to learn participant’s personal
about the phenomenon and social experiences

Identify a phenomenon
Validate the accuracy of
that addresses
the report
an educational problem

Educational Research 2e: Creswell

 C ASE S TUDY D EFINITION

“Case study is a strategy for doing research

which involves an empirical investigation
of a particular contemporary
phenomenon with its real life context
using multiple sources of evidence.”
Yin, 1981
Case Study Workshop, 2007
John C. Bliss, Oregon State University
 C ASE S TUDY D ESIGN

 Real life situation in real time

 Limited in space and time
 Immediate impact
 Immediate relevance
 R ESEARCH P HILOSOPHY

 Ontology: Who are you, who are you studying? Are they your equals or your
subjects? What rights do you consider them to have?

 Epistemology: What do you consider to be knowledge and how does this

affect your data collection and analysis?

 Validity, reliability: Have you found out what you say you found out? Can you
convince others that you have done so? Can you generalise the results to
another situation?
Subjective, Objective,
interpersonal apersonal

Quantitative research
T HE
SLIPPERY SLOPE
 E XAMPLE OF CASE STUDY RESEARCH DESIGN
FROM J O H N S & L E E - R O S S ( 1 9 9 8 ) P. 1 4 8

In-depth interviews Hackman and Oldham's Job Diagnostic Survey

(1980)

Results

Semi-structured Participant observation

interviews

Direct output from research method

Information for research method formulation
 B ENEFITS
The case study method is appropriate to:

 Answer why? Questions;

 Gain an in depth understanding of a particular phenomenon;
 Develop an initial hypothesis;
 Establish a basis for future research;
 Develop new theories;
 Extend existing theories;
 Test existing theory.
 I SSUES
Critics of the case study method often claim:
 Studying a small number of cases is insufficient for establishing reliability or generality of
findings;
 The intense involvement of the researcher in the study of the case could bias the findings;
 Some critics suggest case study research is useful only as an exploratory tool or for establishing
a hypothesis;
 Some would claim it is unscientific.
 A PPLICATION : T HINK OF ONE GENERAL
TOPIC AND MAKE TITLES / TOPICS BASED
ON THE 5 DESIGNS

General Topic:
Design Specific Topic Assumptions
1. Ethnography
2. Phenomenology
3. Grounded Theory
4. Biography
5. Case Study