Qualitative Methods

• Qualitative Research: an umbrella term for multiple methodologies and approaches
• Qualitative Research


  Measuring its quality rather than quantity
• Qualitative Research


  • Open-ended: Research questions tend to be about the "what" and "how"
  • Good when generating theories or new ideas
• Qualitative Research


  • More emphasis on subjectivity rather than objectivity
  • Concerned with personal experience
  • Data is typically words, images, or objects
  • Analysis is usually interpretive
• Quantitative Research


  • Larging testing theories via hypotheses
  • Concerned with testing specific ideas: confirmatory
  • Concerned with causality
• Qualitative Research


  • Creating theories
  • Open to whatever they encounter: exploratory
  • Not concerned with causality
• Quantitative Research


  • Experiences tend to be pre-categorised: closed-ended
  • Meaning is fit: top-down
• Qualitative Research


  • Categories emerge from the data: open-ended
  • Meaning is created: bottom-up
• Quantitative Research


  • Not concerned with researchers' experiences
  • Researcher is distant
  • Researcher influence is controlled
  • Research is value-free?
• Qualitative Research


  • Also concerned with researchers' experiences
  • Researcher is involved
  • Researcher influence is accepted
  • Research is value-laden
• Ontology


  Nature of reality
• Epistemology


  What is knowledge
• Theoretical Approach


  Approach to acquiring knowledge
• Methodology


  Procedure and tools used to acquire knowledge
• Phenomenological Approach


  • Peoples' experiences differ, and you can understand those experiences through research
  • Initial experience is shaped by the situation
  • Can lessen the effect of the interviewer during collection but still a part of the response
• Social Constructivist Approach


  • Reality is totally situation-dependent; no one can ever observe the same thing
  • Initial experience radically subjective
  • Data collection is radically subjective
• Qualitative work can be considered science if it gives you a way to make sense of the data (rules and procedures) and the methodology helps determine whether a belief is more likely true
• Qualitative Sampling


  • Sampling tends to be purposeful
  • Samples tend to be small
  • Samples do not need to be people
• Interview


  A purposeful conversation that involves sharing of ideas & insights between the researcher and participant
• Interview Types


  • Structured - set questions
  • Semi-structured - set questions with the ability to delve into new ideas and unanticipated topics
  • Unstructured - no set questions
• Transcription


  Converting spoken words into written information
• Chunking


  Breaking up written information into units of analysis
• Self Transcription


  Pros: Aware of important issues, Cheap

  Cons: Errors, Convention-less, Slow
• Professional Transcription


  Pros: Few errors, Uses (Jeffersonian), Fast

  Cons: Unaware of important issues, Expensive
• Quantitative Analysis


  • Sentiment analysis
  • Impose top-down codes
• Thematic Analysis


  • Bottom up
  • Develop codes for each chunk
  • Used codes to develop themes
  • Three phases: Get familiar with data, Code your data (bottom-up), Summarize data in a meaningful way
• Themes


  Overarching umbrella classifications for what is happening
• Software


  • AI generation of transcripts
  • AI analysis
  • Software packages (e.g., NVivo)
  • Tools to aid thematic analysis
• More complex methods of qualitative data analysis are best learned through the apprenticeship method by finding people who do this work and learning how they do it in their lab